sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) (05/03/87)
I recently received the ProWrite upgrade, version 1.1. Here's what I
found.
1. ProWrite version 1.1 now comes as two separate programs: the
standard interlace-mode version (cf. my earlier review), and a new
non-interlace 640 x 200 version, called ProWrite MR (MR =
"medium-res"). They work interchangeably on the same files, and both
produce the same hi-res printed output. ProWrite MR, however, uses
non-interlace (non-flicker) medium-res screen display mode.
2. ProWrite MR uses less memory; I have had far fewer memory problems
than with the interlaced ProWrite. Also, ProWrite MR appears to work
faster; windows move and reshape faster. The letters, of course,
appear twice as high. For this reason, estimating vertical distance
on the page is more difficult. ProWrite MR could use a vertical ruler
scale (like some desktop publishing programs have), to facilitate
measuring vertical distance.
3. Other new features in ProWrite 1.1: NLQ (Near Letter Quality)
print mode can now be selected directly from ProWrite, rather than
having to go into Preferences. The up/down cursor keys can be used to
select fonts from the font requester, rather than having to use the
mouse.
Overall, I like ProWrite MR even better than the original
ProWrite. Not only is ProWrite MR devoid of interlace flicker,
but I actually find the larger letters easier to read (my
eyesight is not the best).
Packaged with the ProWrite 1.1 disk, I also found a letter addressed
to me, written by James Bayless (New Horizons Software, the vendor of
ProWrite). Apparently Mr. Bayless had read my earlier review of
ProWrite on comp.sys.amiga, and wanted to reply to it. In the
interest of fairness, I hope you won't mind if I post some excerpts
from his reply. Here they are:
"1. ProWrite is not patterned after MacWrite. In fact, it is
more similar to Microsoft Word on the Macintosh...."
"2. ProWrite will work with hard disks and the RAM disk. If
these volumes are mounted...they can be switched to by clicking
on the 'Disk' button in the 'Open' and 'Save' requesters. In
fact, anything that has a volume entry (and is mounted) can be
switched to in this manner..."
"3. Yes, Granite is a slightly modified version of the Mac's
Geneva font (Marble is a modified New York, and Serpentine is
Los Angeles). They work well for the Mac, and we don't mind if
they are released to the public domain (we are not selling the
fonts, just the program)."
"4. The quality of the print-out is determined by the printer
driver's resolution in graphics mode. The ImageWriter II driver
has a 160 dpi by 72 dpi resolution (horiz. by vert.) and so
renders ProWrite's internal resolution of 80 by 72 very well.
The Okimate [20] does only 120 by 72 (I believe), which results
in poorer output for thin fonts (since 120 is not a multiple of
80)."
"5. The color palette is fixed to the same colors that are on
printer ribbons. To try and do any other colors would produce
dithered output....almost unreadable in some cases....."
"6. It is currently not possible to make picture insertion in
ProWrite as convenient as the Mac, since to my knowledge no
Amiga paint program supports the Amiga clipboard....We are
considering a future option to read graphics into an existing
document....rather than reading them into a separate
window...."
"7. ProWrite will work fine with daisy wheel printers....the
internal resolution is designed so that Topaz 11 will produce
the correct positioning for 10 cpi, 6 lpi text."
"8. ProWrite supports *all* printers in Preferences. If there
is a driver for a laser printer....then ProWrite will work with
it. We are looking into having PostScript compatibility, but
we feel that currently not many Amiga owners have access to a
PostScript printer...."
"9. ProWrite works well with the color text produced by
Calligrapher. You can therefore create any font (dithered or
not) with Calligrapher and use it with ProWrite...."
"10. The original version had a problem printing on 512K
systems when memory became fragmented....To print in standard
mode requires about 48K of graphics memory in fairly large
pieces....We have (hopefully) overcome this problem with the
current version."
Steven Litvintchouk
MITRE Corporation
Burlington Road
Bedford, MA 01730
Fone: (617)271-7753
ARPA: sdl@mitre-bedford
UUCP: ...{cbosgd,decvax,genrad,ll-xn,philabs,security,utzoo}!linus!sdlhadeishi@husc7.HARVARD.EDU (Mitsuharu Hadeishi) (05/03/87)
I did notice, however, that text wraps around images very slooowly. (I played with a ProWrite demo on a Turbo Amiga some three or four weeks ago). Perhaps this has been addressed in a future update of ProWrite. In fact, I felt the reformatting around images was unacceptably slow. -Mit@c