Editing multiple documents simultaneously

Posted by Dr Andus
Jan 11, 2013 at 11:05 PM

MadaboutDana wrote:
>I’m just editing six brochures simultaneously, all of which share
>similar bits and pieces of text. And I’m struck by how badly modern
>authoring programs handle this very straightforward situation.

> In fact, the longer I reflect on this, the more I
>conclude that the actual process of writing documents on computer hasn’t
>progressed much at all (pace Scrivener lovers and all you ConnectedText
>fans!).

>Now, ConnectedText proponents will, no doubt, tell me that CT does all
>this and more. I’m sorry, but impressive as CT undoubtedly is,
>user-friendly it is not.

One needs to make a distinction between writing and editing (esp. 6 docs simultaneously). Also, writing can have many different stages from note-taking and “brainstorming” to writing the final draft. I still haven’t found a single software that can cover all the steps involved and perhaps there never will be one (and that might be a good thing).

Re: CT, I’d recommend it for note-taking, storage, analysis and outlining but not for the writing and editing process, exactly because it only has one edit/view window, so you can’t view your notes and write about them at the same time. Which is why I use a separate software for actual writing (Outline 4D) (while looking at the CT notes), and yet another one for word processing (Word).

With O4D you could definitely lay out 6 docs across two monitors and work on them simultaneously. Here are what 3 docs looks like on a 22in monitor:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/428516/Outline4D_2013-01-11_22-52-43.png

But you still won’t get auto-comparison / auto-concordancing…

BTW, CT might not be at its friendliest to the first-time user, but it makes up for it later :)