smithc@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Christopher Smith) (04/15/91)
After having MS Word 4.0 crash three times on me last night for no reason whatsoever -- I was looking up a quote, MS Word was doing nothing, and it crashed; I clicked on the menubar, and it crashed; I stared at it cross-eyed, and I SWEAR! it crashed -- which kept me up until 2:30am instead of 11:00pm or so, my interest in Nisus has leaped quite a bit. I've spent a good block of time going back over previous articles in this group and have found very little on Nisus, at least along the lines of what I'd like to know. So, this is directed to those of you with hands-on experience with Nisus. How does Nisus compare to MS Word? More specifically: * how compatible is it with other word processing formats; * does it have the section support MS Word does, ie. can I have different headers/footers/etc for certain pages; * does it support a table format like MS Word does; * does it have footnoting features; * is Nisus relatively fast, specifically with the spell- checking, searching, and search/replace? A lot of questions, I know, but those are my main concerns. ANY feedback addressing these points would be greatly appreciated! Because I do not get much of a chance to read the newsgroups, please send responses via email to smithc@stolaf.edu. If there is enough interest I will put up a summary of everyone's comments. Thanks very much! Christopher Smith St. Olaf College, Northfield MN Internet: smithc@stolaf.edu
chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach, net.god {retired}) (04/17/91)
smithc@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Christopher Smith) writes: >After having MS Word 4.0 crash three times on me last night for no >reason whatsoever -- I was looking up a quote, MS Word was doing >nothing, and it crashed; No offense, but it seems to me that you have two choices: o you can switch Word Processors or o you can find out why your system is crashing. Word 4.0 is quite stable for most folks -- if you're crashing a lot, you better find out why. It's unlikely to be Word -- are you sure you aren't killing the messenger here? -- Chuq Von Rospach >=< chuq@apple.com >=< GEnie: CHUQ >=< AppleLink: CHUQ SFWA Nebula Awards Reports Editor =+= Editor, OtherRealms Book Reviewer, Amazing Stories ---@--- #include <standard/disclaimer.h> Recommended: ORION IN THE DYING TIME Ben Bova (Tor, Aug, ***-); SACRED VISIONS Greeley&Cassutt (Tor, Aug, ****+); MEN AT WORK George Will (****); XENOCIDE Orson Scott Card (August, ****); GOBLIN MOON Teresa Edgerton (***)
jas@ISI.EDU (Jeff Sullivan) (04/18/91)
In article <1991Apr14.220122.8800@news.stolaf.edu> smithc@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Christopher Smith) writes: >After having MS Word 4.0 crash three times on me last night for no >reason whatsoever -- I was looking up a quote, MS Word was doing >nothing, and it crashed; I clicked on the menubar, and it crashed; I >stared at it cross-eyed, and I SWEAR! it crashed -- which kept me up >until 2:30am instead of 11:00pm or so, my interest in Nisus has leaped >quite a bit. > >I've spent a good block of time going back over previous articles in >this group and have found very little on Nisus, at least along the >lines of what I'd like to know. So, this is directed to those of you >with hands-on experience with Nisus. > >How does Nisus compare to MS Word? More specifically: > > * how compatible is it with other word processing formats; It imports MacWrite and Word4.0 (but not fast-saved files). It preserves most of the formatting -- all it supports, I guess. > * does it have the section support MS Word does, ie. can I > have different headers/footers/etc for certain pages; Not that familiar with word's sections. You can have a new header on each page in Nisus. > * does it support a table format like MS Word does; No. > * does it have footnoting features; Yes. > * is Nisus relatively fast, specifically with the spell- > checking, searching, and search/replace? Very fast, *but* it keeps the whole file in RAM, so there's a ram-based limit to the size of files you can edit. It's search/replace functionality is the best there is. (relatively) easy-to-use grep with styles and fonts. Sweet. There is, however, a "feature" in Nisus that caused me to abandon it for my scriptwriting. When you hold down command and change a paragraph, all paragraphs with the same ruler type are changes as well. This causes quite a substantial delay (4-6 minutes on my MacII) while it does this on my 100+ page scripts. On my partner's MacPlus, it hasn't come back on occasion. Since a this happens 1-3 times per writing session, it's too big a hassle, even given the other advantages. Too bad. I still use it for other stuff. jas -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Jeffrey A. Sullivan | Senior Systems Programmer jas@venera.isi.edu | Information Sciences Institute jas@isi.edu | University of Southern California
baumgart@esquire.dpw.com (Steve Baumgarten) (04/19/91)
In article <1991Apr14.220122.8800@news.stolaf.edu> smithc@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Christopher Smith) writes:
How does Nisus compare to MS Word? More specifically:
* how compatible is it with other word processing formats;
It imports/exports MacWrite and Word 3/4, but not fast-saved files.
* does it have the section support MS Word does, ie. can I
have different headers/footers/etc for certain pages;
Don't know about sections, but you can change headers/footers whenever
you like.
* does it support a table format like MS Word does;
No, there's no table support as such. It has a decent drawing module
built-in, though, which might do for simple tables.
* does it have footnoting features;
Yes, and it does a good job handling footnotes.
* is Nisus relatively fast, specifically with the spell-
checking, searching, and search/replace?
Yes to both. Definitely the best search/replace out there, since you
can search on styles, fonts, etc. It also has built-in grep and a
friendly way to use it.
Other nice features: Great built-in macro language. You can do just
about anything you want to with it. There are macros to do general
typographic cleanup (change multiple spaces to single spaces, "--" to
em-dashes, etc.), macros to delete ".bak" files... all sorts of
things. I wrote one to strip fonts from the PostScript0 files I
create and upload to my Unix box at work for printing.
Also, my favorite features: unlimited undos and multiple selections.
It's great to be able to undo and redo more than just your last
action, and you can't imagine how you ever got along without multiple
selections until you use Nisus. I like being able to highlight all
the words I want to put into italics at once, and then selecting
"Italic" from the Style menu one time to change all of them. A real
time-saver, and something I always thought should be in the Human
Interface Guidelines.
I think there's a demo available from Paragon if you want to give it a
try. They can be reached at:
Paragon Concepts, Inc.
990 Highland Drive, Suite 312
Solana Beach, CA 92075
(619) 481-1477
Hope this helps.
--
Steve Baumgarten | "New York... when civilization falls apart,
Davis Polk & Wardwell | remember, we were way ahead of you."
baumgart@esquire.dpw.com |
cmcl2!esquire!baumgart | - David Letterman