Word processing - what do you use?

[nathanscribe]

Just curious. I often like to write by hand and then type up before editing, but I've been dabbling with different software for a while.

Win XP/MS Word 2003 - bleh, too much like work.
MS DOS 5.0/MS Word 5.0 - wonderfully simple and defaults to blue. Plug in my Model M and enjoy.
OSX/Pages - OK, simpler than Word and a bit nicer.
OSX/Scrivener - early days and am still confused by what to do with it. Bargain though and interesting.

I used to enjoy my Canon Starwriter and Brother WP-somethingorother. And I can still enjoy the pleasures of monochromatic letterbox displays with my new Alphasmart Neo2, which is a minor revelation to me - after ditching the PDA with portable keyboard, and not wanting to throw money at an iPad with portable keyboard, I find the Neo to be useful precisely because it does almost nothing except store text and has a ridiculous battery life (700 hours or so).

What are your preferences?

[Brian8bit]

Pages on OSX. Does what I need it to. Can't complain.

[Crazy9000]

At home I mostly just use notepad, as I'm not writing papers or anything.

At work we use open office since it's free, and works on all the pc's, regardless of OS.

[Findecanor]

I usually do most of the work in a text editor. Either, I write it directly in a markup/formatting language, such as LaTeX or I transfer it into OpenOffice and do the formatting there
I wrote all my assignments and papers in college in LaTeX. Formatting long division in LaTeX can be tricky, but it got the job done.
I use OO.org mostly at work, using the company's templates.

The text editors I use:
- Linux: gedit, and pico (!). No, I do not use either emacs or vi.
- Windows: Notepad++

[NewGuy]

I like to use minimal text editors when I can get away with it, which is a lot of the time actually. When I need something a bit more heavy-duty, I will switch over to Libre Office.

On a Mac, Byword seems like a good choice.
On my iPad, I love writing in iA Writer.

Haven't really found anything like these for Windows yet, though that doesn't really surprise me…

[Pylon]

Right now LibreOffice.

[webwit]

I hate both Apple and Microsoft, but after the last round Windows 7/Office wins. Mac OS X and Pages are overrated.

[NewGuy]

Both are terrible in my opinion—Office is so bloated at this point and has that awful "ribbon" UI, Pages is Pages…
LibreOffice is pretty close to Office—not as fully-featured, but it also doesn't cost an arm and a leg, and I try to stay out of it where possible.

Curious about why you think Windows 7 is better than OSX. 7 is pretty good these days after the disaster that was Vista, but as a desktop OS, OSX is far better in my opinion—and my primary machine is now Windows 7 based. I felt that I couldn't justify the hardware price any more when all the important applications I use are multi-platform now. As time goes on, I'm starting to question that decision…

[mSSM]

Since my 2nd year undergrad studies I have completely switched to LaTeX. First I mainly typeset papers with it, but now I also do cover letters, my CV, and what else comes around. Personally, I think a properly typeset document in LaTeX is a very beautiful thing and can hardly be beat by other methods. I think everybody should try working with it. At first, it might be unusual working this way, but the results are amazing.

I have to say that I simply cannot work with WYSIWYG word processors like MS Word or LibreOffice writer any longer. It simply drives me mad.

As a text editor I use vim.

[webwit]

Curious about why you think Windows 7 is better than OSX.

Well, you can look at this two ways. First is a feature by feature comparison, they'll both earn points, e.g. I like OSX backup. But in the end Windows 7 has much more and can be configured much more.

Then there's daily operation, the workflow, how smooth are they? Apple beaten in its own game of usability. Windows taskbar is much better than the horrible dock, and the dragging and resizing of windows, making one half size, etc. is where Windows 7 shines. Operation is smoother and cleaner. It seems to deal better with resources and multi-tasking. When I stress OSX, I get the "busy" cursor a lot, and unlike the Windows equivalent, the whole system slows down including the cursor itself.

Of course, this is the winner in the category of bloated OS. A simple windows manager on *nix does also launch a browser.

[webwit]

I don't do much word processing, but when I do, I always run in trouble if I want to do more than the equivalent of Windows' Write. Do people just make headers, lists, bold, italics, and that stuff? I hardly do complex stuff, but I run into trouble anyway.

For example (and this is just one), I sometimes write an organized document of specs like this:
a. Chapter
a.b Section
a.b.c Item
a.b.c.d List item

With a-d replaced with increasing numbers.
This makes points in the document easy to reference.
Then I'd like the margins to line up.

So then you notice all word processors are utter crap, and the only one which manages is Word (and not smoothly). Pages can't do it properly. Must admit I haven't tried Open/Libre for a while, but last time it was really bad in those kind of details. Google Docs? It's "Write" Online, can't do multi-level lists. Possibly there are others, but I haven't been interested enough to try them.

[nathanscribe]

Regarding OS comparisons, I'm not in a position to need to delve much, and I tend to do one thing at a time. I prefer OSX and it's better now than it was in 2005 when I got my first Mac (though I'd been using them on and off since '96, alongside various incarnations of Windows). But that's just a preference, not a comparison. On a side note, and I'm not saying this is happening here, I get fed up of the endless OS-bashing or Mac/PC bashing that goes on in various places... these things are all just tools and if they do what you want, nobody else need worry.

As for many word processors being crap, I'm inclined to agree... which is why I like the old DOS machine I have set up almost exclusively for that. It does so little compared to modern software it's almost fun to use. With the Neo2 I can type without thinking about formatting or editing (because it's not geared for that) and I always feel a combination of disappointment and trepidation when it comes to finalising things in a 'proper' WP. They're never what I want them to be.

[Daniel Beaver]

vi and LaTeX.
...
...
...
...
Nah, I'm kidding.

For work-related document creation (i.e., things that need to be printed out), I use Office 2010. For pure text input, I use gedit or Notepad++; I nearly always type forum posts on these. For config file editing and script management, I use Vim (or Nano if I get frustrated with Vim).


On the subject of OSes:
I use a mix of Windows and Linux machines, depending on what I'm doing. I drank the Windows7/MSOffice2010 koolaid, and have been quite content with it. Applications are more important than operating systems, and Windows runs nearly everything.

I don't understand why people like OSX. The core OS is good, but its window management paradigm is bizarre.

[xbb]

It's personal preference ot use OSX or Windows.
Anyway I use Office on Windows and Pages on OSX, but I try to move to Google Docs

[webwit]

It's a personal preference which clouds the fact that Windows 7 is just better. They are not identical in accumulative quality, only one can be the best, and "personal preference" is a cheap tool to skip any argumentation. Let me repeat I wish both companies sink to the pits of hell so I have no personal preference based on positive brand emotion - I am a MS/Apple hate-boy. The last fanboy war I was in was over twenty years ago when it was Amiga vs Atari ST, you cannot even make me care since then. Maybe next iteration, Apple will be on top again.

[nathanscribe]

It's a personal preference which clouds the fact that Windows 7 is just better. They are not identical in accumulative quality, only one can be the best, and "personal preference" is a cheap tool to skip any argumentation.

I don't agree with that last comment. I think that just because something is 'objectively better' (ie, has more features, greater power, whatever) does not make it 'better' for all users in all circumstances for all purposes. I think 'better' is indeed partly down to personal preference and/or requirement, not simply a summary of objective factors. I agree that in terms of feature set, speed, performance and other similar things, one piece of software will be the top of the heap for one reason or another - but in practical terms, people want to work in a way that is conducive to it for them. Regarding my own preferences - I've no objective justification, I don't care whether X is 'better' than Y on some list, I just use things and decide whether they suit me. As do others by the looks of it, hence the interesting diversity of software mentioned already.

[yench]

I agree with nathanscribe. The hard facts are indeed important, but if something doesn't 'feel good' for you, you won't be happy with it.

I'm using Win 7 and Office 2010 because I get it for free through MSDNAA. In my studies, I'm working in ever changing groups of people and documents are usually worked on by every group member and Office gets the job done without much hassle (there may be better ways but it's a pain to 'train' people before they can contribute. Yes, I'm a bitch).

[webwit]

How is it better? Describe it in other ways than just feeling.

[mSSM]

How did you guys get to comparing Windows to MacOS from the question which Word processing people use?

See, there is no such thing as "objectively better". I am a die-hard Linux user for 5 years now, and there is now way anybody could possibly convince me that either MacOS or Windows is better for my needs - neither for instance offers a fully functioning tiling window manager and the possibility to complete control your work flow using a keyboard only.

@ Webwit:
Latex would shine in the example you gave in the earlier post (i.e. numeration of sections). Give it a try.

[yakill]

Libre Office for short/simple text/letters.
LaTeX for extended texts and those with some subsections, abstract and illustrations.

[webwit]

I'm just curious and wonder what makes it good for people. It's better because it feels better, but you can't describe what it is that makes it feel better doesn't quite supply that knowledge to me. I'm not a daily Apple user so maybe I'm missing something.

[yench]

I didn't say that 'feeling' has anything to do with being the objectively better product. One may think a product feels better because it's free, because it's open source, because it's Apple, because it's not Apple, because it's pink. You name it. Then it could be similar to what I 'feel' when I play FPS Games: Quake feels better than Unreal. In my opinion. There are most likely die hard Unreal fans.

One thing that comes to my mind is the feeling of cloth. Some people like silk, some like leather. Some neither. Probably a bad analogy as well.

[webwit]

Weirdest thing. I state I think Windows/Office is better, someone is curious about my reasons, I think about some things that make it better for me, and state them. Then I ask some guys who think OSX is better why think that, and the only thing they bounce back is "feeling." I did not get any real reasons. Nor will they below in this thread.

That's why Windows 7 is objectively better.

It's a sad state of affairs if people can't describe why they think something is better, yet feel that their complacent opinion of "feel" is equal. No it is not, not even close. The quality of an OS is not like whether you like a color. Actually, it is all an insult of reason. You fail to recognize anything factual, factual evidence is passed off as garbage, you don't provide any of your own.

[nathanscribe]

Anyway, about that thread title topic...

[webwit]

Write or Google docs if you don't care, Open Source if that works for you, Office if you need the power, Pages if you Believe, Latex if you have a huge beard.

[mSSM]

Write or Google docs if you don't care, Open Source if that works for you, Office if you need the power, Pages if you Believe, Latex if you have a huge beard.

You, sir, have obviously not used LaTeX. And no, having written one paper with it does not count.

Compared to it, any "office" suit pales.

[webwit]

Show us your beard

[JBert]

Latex if you have a huge amount of text.

FTFY.
For most purposes, LaTeX is likely overkill or plain "fancy", but once you get a document setup it does typeset long texts like no other.


Oh, and do stubbles count as a potential beard?

[webwit]

Depends on what location of your body.

[Brian8bit]

Microsoft Office is definitely the best package you can get, it's still the most popular office suite on Mac OSX (ahead of Apples own). I barely do any word processing or require the type of package that MS Office provides, so I get along fine with Pages and Numbers at the minute (for a fraction of the price of Office). I'm sure if I was back studying though, MS Office would be one of the first pieces of software I'd buy.

From years of using Linux I've come to absolute despise Open Office. Besides I'm not a fan of anything written in Java. I found I preferred Abiword, gEdit and Nano.

As regards to Windows 7 or OS X. Windows 7 is great. But then so is OS X. Each in their own way. I'm happy to recommend Windows 7 for others, use Linux on my servers, but my own personal desktop preference is OS X.