jahromib@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (Babak Jahromi) (10/20/90)
I would like to thank the many people that replied on this topic (and also sent me email). I would like to reiterate a few points though: 1) Some of my fellow st'ers did not take well to my lack of appreciation for gem. My response is that gem is SLOW. text scrolling is laborious (and please don't tell me to run quick st or turbo st. Also, I mentioned _wordprocessing_ *not* DTP. When I wish to do simple dtp, I haul out my calamus and do a quick page. For real, complicated dtp (trust me, I have worked at a professional typesetting company) I rent time and use quark express on a mac ci, lino it and have the printers print 1000 or so newsletters. BUT, this is *not* wordprocessing. For wordPROCESSING, you do NOT want to be bothered by column placement, pixel shifts, microspacing, kerning, leading, etc. You wish to type, ie PROCESS words QUICKLY, and a window interface is a nuisance. Believe me, hitting some fkey to insert a code is far easier than fiddling with the ruler (and faster). And for those who may think that wind/icon/mou/pointer interfaces (the brave new world and rebirth of man/comp relationships) has made text and cli's (the diehard ignoramuses who refuse to catch up to the times) extinct, may I remind you that any operating system worth its salt has a shell. 2) many have kindly suggested a variety of ST progams (st writer elite, wordup, wordflair, etc.) Unfortunately, NONE come even close to the formatting dictionary, thesaurus, sort, merge, record, page layout (all in text!) footnote/endnote/bibiography, macro programmability, most important of all printer support (customizable!) of wordperfect (4.2 on). I am sorry to repeat the name "wordperfect", but I consider it a standard with its *combination* (note emphasis) of features that NO wordprocessor has approached. 3) other alternatives were suggested (Tex/Latex, nroff, etc.) I am honestly inclined to vi my stuff and then run it thru troff before I touch something windows based, and these suggestions are quite reasonable. The only excuse I have is that I prefer wordperfect's codes much better than typing in ".commands" and find its slight degree of onscreen formatting/character emphasis helpful. 4)WP 4.1 for the ST is buggy, clunky, and unreliable (this is the OFFICIAL release version by wp corp. fully updated). Using it is a misery, considering what it could have been. 4.2 does NOT exist (to my knowledge), neither is WP likely to release it (or higher versions, for that matter). Finally, this is only my opinion. Obviously, many (quite rightly) will prefer the windowed interface and their favourite wordprocessor and I do not aim to batter down someone's opinion. Its just that the lack of choice and power on my st bugs me in this instance. thanx for your time, Babak
ekrimen@csuchico.edu (Ed Krimen) (10/20/90)
- 1) Some of my fellow st'ers did not take well to my lack of - appreciation for gem. Which is fine. I can respect other people's preferences (I think :^). - My response is that gem is SLOW. text scrolling is laborious (and - please don't tell me to run quick st or turbo st. Why not? What's wrong with either of them? They offer a dramatic improvement even on an STe. I've said this before, and I'll say it again, that coming home to my STe is heaven after working on a Mac IIfx. The text drawing with TurboST or QuickST is great. Have you even seen them? - You wish to type, ie PROCESS words QUICKLY, and a window interface - is a nuisance. Geez, you can't please everybody, can you? Most people (I know this is an irrational generalization) would think that they are a luxury. I think of a couple of text editors, like Emacs, ProText, and others, which I'm sure you've heard of, that offer text edited features, but no word processing functions. Guess you're stuck. - Believe me, hitting some fkey to insert a code is far easier than - fiddling with the ruler (and faster). And for those who may think - that wind/icon/mou/pointer interfaces (the brave new world and - rebirth of man/comp relationships) has made text and cli's (the - diehard ignoramuses who refuse to catch up to the times) extinct, - may I remind you that any operating system worth its salt has a - shell. I'm a wind/icon/mou/pointer, specifically GEM, kind of person. This is why I didn't buy an IBM in 1988. But each to his own. - 4)WP 4.1 for the ST is buggy, clunky, and unreliable (this is the - OFFICIAL release version by wp corp. fully updated). Using it is a - misery, considering what it could have been. 4.2 does NOT exist (to - my knowledge), neither is WP likely to release it (or higher - versions, for that matter). I'm sorry you can't find what you're looking for. I was almost sure that WP for the ST would have fit your bill, but alas, I was wrong. Moreover, you seem to be the programming type. Why not write one and sell it? :^) I'm sure there are few other ST users like you. - Its just that the lack of choice and power on my st bugs me in this - instance. Unfortunately. On a machine who's default mode is a GUI, it would be pretty hard to imagine anything but a GUI for a word processor. I think that one reason most people (another irrational generalization, I know) bought the ST was for its easy-of-use. Luckily, for those power users who like a shell, those are available for the ST. -- ========================================================================== Ed Krimen - ekrimen@csuchico.edu - ||| SysOp, Fuji BBS 916-894-1261 Video Production Major ||| [ THIS SPACE AVAILABLE ] California State University, Chico / | \ [ LEAVE E-MAIL ]
dwy47@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Deanna W Yang) (10/20/90)
> on [WP] [...hitting an fkey is much faster and nicer than playing with the > rulers...] I think it's just a matter of preference. I never really like the WordPerfect (IBM or even mac version). I do most of my wp work at school or at work and I always use MSWord. I am a mouse/pointer/icon/menu kind of person. It's just bothering to use WordPerfect when I have to format the text here and there (usually out of order) and I have to juggle with fkeys (ctrl, shift, alt) and space bars, tabs, arrow keys....I would do much faster and better with a mouse, then the sequence ^f7,1,2,4,6 (as an example only, not a real sequence) (and I have to remember or use a template or cheat sheet). But of course there are a lot of diehard IBM (even IBM is going windows and menu systems and all sorts...you give me a reason) users who still prefer fkeys applications. To them it's easy to use and powerful. To them, a mouse is like a mouse, real hard to catch.
shipley@tron.UUCP (Bill Shipley) (10/22/90)
I think that version 5.1 of WordPerfect (which runs very well under PC-Speed on the ST) is very nearly an ideal solution. It offers very nice mouse support - you can use the mouse for nearly everything but text entry - but retains keyboard oriented commands for those who prefer them. Version 4.1 for the ST has the same options, but unfortunately is not as powerful as 5.1. It does not offer WYSIWYG, except in screen preview, but this makes for much faster display speed. Bill Shipley
iho@cac.washington.edu (Il Oh) (10/23/90)
In article <655@tron.UUCP> shipley@tron.bwi.wec.com.UMD.EDU (Bill Shipley) writes: >I think that version 5.1 of WordPerfect (which runs very well under PC-Speed >on the ST) is very nearly an ideal solution. It offers very nice mouse >support - you can use the mouse for nearly everything but text entry - but It might be "very nice mouse support" by WordPerfect's standards, but not by anyone else's. Sure you can put the cursor where you want by clicking on the place, but I reserve the aforementioned description for the likes of MS Word (either the Mac or the Windows version) which is so much more advanced in the mouse support department that they aren't even the same league. Note this is not a criticism of WP 5.1 as a word processor (in fact, I prefer it to MS Word) but a criticism of their "mouse support". >retains keyboard oriented commands for those who prefer them. Version 4.1 >for the ST has the same options, but unfortunately is not as powerful as >5.1. It does not offer WYSIWYG, except in screen preview, but this makes for >much faster display speed. Version 4.1 (as well as 4.2, for that matter) has suffers from more serious deficiencies than not being WYSIWYG. (WP 5.1 isn't WYSIWYG, either. You just have a "preview" option) Its support of fonts is _severely_ limited. The advance from 4.1 to 4.2 was minor in my book, but from 4.2 to 5.0 was a monumental leap, mostly because 5.0 was the first version of WP to _really_ support fonts. It's fine and dandy to have a word processor that can spell check (WP has the best I've seen. It looks for words that "sound alike" rather than spelled alike) and has a thesaurus built-in, but you should be able to print out documents that are acceptable in today's business world. Courier font documents are _not_ acceptable by today's standards. The microcomputer revolution didn't improve productivity, it just raised the level of quality expected in business documents. In fact, productivity is now lower because we have management people fiddling around with their documents to fix "just one more thing". -- "Gosh! You've really got | Il Hwan Oh some nice toys in here." | University of Washington, Tacoma -- Roy Batty, Bladerunner | iho@cac.washington.edu |
shipley@tron.UUCP (Bill Shipley) (10/23/90)
WordPerfect Version 5.1 can do much more than position the cursor with the mouse. You can block text, select commands from drop down menus, and make selections from all subsequent menus entirely with the mouse (except of course for text or data entry). I have looked at Word for Windows and I don't see much more mouse support than WordPerfect, other than window and graphics sizing and document scrolling. I don't think you have looked closely at Version 5.1. Most of the real mouse support has been added after Version 5.0. Bill Shipley
iho@cac.washington.edu (Il Oh) (10/24/90)
In article <657@tron.UUCP> shipley@tron.bwi.wec.com.UMD.EDU (Bill Shipley) writes: >WordPerfect Version 5.1 can do much more than position the cursor with the >mouse. You can block text, select commands from drop down menus, and make >selections from all subsequent menus entirely with the mouse (except of >course for text or data entry). I have looked at Word for Windows and I >don't see much more mouse support than WordPerfect, other than window and >graphics sizing and document scrolling. I don't think you have looked >closely at Version 5.1. Most of the real mouse support has been added after >Version 5.0. Oh, do get serious. Alt-= to bring up the menu? What mental giant came up with the idea of having a keyboard command to bring up drop-down menus? -- "Gosh! You've really got | Il Hwan Oh some nice toys in here." | University of Washington, Tacoma -- Roy Batty, Bladerunner | iho@cac.washington.edu |
silvert@cs.dal.ca (Bill Silvert) (10/24/90)
In article <9803@milton.u.washington.edu> iho@akbar.UUCP (Il Oh) writes: > >Oh, do get serious. Alt-= to bring up the menu? What mental giant came >up with the idea of having a keyboard command to bring up drop-down >menus? It's totally optional. Normally the menu is present. The ALT key is used only if for some reason you don't want the menu most of the time but want to invoke it occasionally. -- William Silvert, Habitat Ecology Division, Bedford Inst. of Oceanography P. O. Box 1006, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, CANADA B2Y 4A2. Tel. (902)426-1577 UUCP=..!{uunet|watmath}!dalcs!biomel!bill BITNET=bill%biomel%dalcs@dalac InterNet=bill%biomel@cs.dal.ca
iho@cac.washington.edu (Il Oh) (10/25/90)
In article <1990Oct24.125436.13810@cs.dal.ca> bill%biomel@cs.dal.ca writes: >In article <9803@milton.u.washington.edu> iho@akbar.UUCP (Il Oh) writes: >> >>Oh, do get serious. Alt-= to bring up the menu? What mental giant came >>up with the idea of having a keyboard command to bring up drop-down >>menus? > >It's totally optional. Normally the menu is present. The ALT key is >used only if for some reason you don't want the menu most of the time >but want to invoke it occasionally. If what you say is true, it's a feature in the newer releases of WP 5.1. The versions I used (about 6 months ago) did not start up with the mouse menus. In light of this new information, I stand corrected. It _does_ look really ugly, though, unless they've changed that, too. -- "Gosh! You've really got | Il Hwan Oh some nice toys in here." | University of Washington, Tacoma -- Roy Batty, Bladerunner | iho@cac.washington.edu |
silvert@cs.dal.ca (Bill Silvert) (10/25/90)
In article <9860@milton.u.washington.edu> iho@akbar.UUCP (Il Oh) writes: >> >>It's totally optional. Normally the menu is present. The ALT key is >>used only if for some reason you don't want the menu most of the time >>but want to invoke it occasionally. > >If what you say is true, it's a feature in the newer releases of WP 5.1. >The versions I used (about 6 months ago) did not start up with the mouse >menus. In light of this new information, I stand corrected. It _does_ >look really ugly, though, unless they've changed that, too. You have to select the menus in setup. Shift-F1,2,4,8 is the sequence to leave the menu bar visible. You can also change the appearance of the menu. I suggest that further queries about WP 5.1 go to a PC group. -- William Silvert, Habitat Ecology Division, Bedford Inst. of Oceanography P. O. Box 1006, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, CANADA B2Y 4A2. Tel. (902)426-1577 UUCP=..!{uunet|watmath}!dalcs!biomel!bill BITNET=bill%biomel%dalcs@dalac InterNet=bill%biomel@cs.dal.ca