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Mellel 6 released (Mac only)
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Posted by Dormouse
Dec 19, 2023 at 01:09 PM
MadaboutDana wrote:
>Well, anyone working with corporate clients more or less automatically
>has to use Word.
only If you’re an employee, else you can do anything you want
>Over the years, I’ve tried replacing Word with
>other soi-disant Word-compatible apps (StarOffice, OpenOffice,
>LibreOffice, SoftMaker Office…), but have inevitably come across
>issues with all of them
So, effectively, ALL the alternatives are worse
>And yes, Word is infuriating. As it continues to evolve, new bugs
>continue to crop up. I’m currently having problems with one of the
>most basic functions, Search, which is ridiculous. And you can’t
>comment on headers or footers, or on footnotes. Which is also
>ridiculous. It also has a nasty way of suddenly crashing out completely,
I very rarely have a crash from Word. Less often in fact than I had from Obsidian in the past (don’t often use it now). And the backups work smoothly. I’ve never tried to stick a comment on headers, footers or footnotes; that’s an end stage publish process - none of my markets want such things, and if I’m publishing a document myself for some reason I don’t need a comment. Many of my editing comments to myself are in the form of colours or emojis, and those do work.
I have noticed more consistent antipathy from Mac users and comments that the Mac version is worse than Windows, and certainly less native. idk how different they really are. I use it mostly for writing. And always found it better than the alternatives for general WP functions and markdown doesn’t even begin to compete.
>Ah, when I look back at the joys of using WordPerfect 5.2 on MS-DOS
> ... I was a bit of a WordPerfect demon. Goodness, how time flies!
And, of course, WP still exists, is actively developed and maintained and still particularly successful with law firms.
I think MS have done very well with evolving Word, retaining its old markets. If these WPs didn’t exist in such a complete form already, no-one would set out to develop one. They were designed to meet the needs of a point in time, and then twisted and tweaked to meet the needs of further points in time. With technology always changing rapidly. I never imagined I would ever use it to write, but do think it’s become very usable for that over the last decade.
Though that may be because I prefer writing within a single file. I don’t think it has the management features for working with multiple small files smoothly - though I have never looked.
Posted by Amontillado
Dec 19, 2023 at 05:39 PM
My separation with Word in my personal life came long ago. I tried to use master documents. Back then, it was extremely easy to entangle subdocuments. The wise Word enthusiast, at least back then, pretended master document mode didn’t exist because it was deadly easy to mangle documents.
I think I’d still look at alternatives to master documents. DocxManager, for example.
Word has come a long way and is the tool of choice for many productive writers.
In the end, little-w words mean much more than Word, my beloved Mellel, vim, or anything else. Use what works for you. If conditions are hostile to preference, use export to docx and don’t tell what you really used. ;-)
Posted by Dormouse
Dec 19, 2023 at 06:47 PM
Amontillado wrote:
>I think I’d still look at alternatives to master documents. DocxManager,
>for example.
DocxManager has no dark mode, and I’ve seen references to total data loss (maybe even in this forum).
But even if it works, it doesn’t as stable and effective as many of the writing programs - Ulysses, Scrivener, Inspire Writer etc.
>Back then, it was extremely easy to entangle
>subdocuments. The wise Word enthusiast, at least back then, pretended
>master document mode didn’t exist because it was deadly easy to mangle
>documents.
Master documents & subdocuments still work easily, but the vied switching doesn’t work as well as with the writing programs.
My dislike of the Scrivener et al system of building from the cards/scenes, is maybe a quirk of my own that I have realised over the years. It feels as if it puts the emphasis on the components and takes it away from the whole. I have a better grasp working from the whole document. Word now has good outline views (much better than the other WPs I have tried), and I prefer to work within that. Plus doing development work in Mindomo and exporting/copying into the docx.
>In the end, little-w words mean much more than Word, my beloved Mellel,
>vim, or anything else. Use what works for you. If conditions are hostile
>to preference, use export to docx and don’t tell what you really used.
>;-)
Agree completely
Posted by Amontillado
Dec 19, 2023 at 10:44 PM
I like Scrivener in principle. At one time I was an enthusiastic user. The company behind Scrivener is truly an independent writer’s friend, something that can also said of the company behind Ulysses (Soulmen?).
However, a note taking application alongside a nice word processor with an outline based navigation panel is more to my liking. The note taking app, for me, is like Scrivener’s research folder. The word processor’s navigation panel is like Scrivener’s Draft Binder - and I realize the Binder does a whole lot more.
“Compiling” by switching style sets has been all I’ve really needed.
That’s sad about data loss in DocxManager. The developer is a nice guy and I’ve always hoped things worked out for him.
Dormouse wrote:
>
>Amontillado wrote:
>>I think I’d still look at alternatives to master documents.
>DocxManager,
>>for example.
>
>DocxManager has no dark mode, and I’ve seen references to total data
>loss (maybe even in this forum).
>But even if it works, it doesn’t as stable and effective as many of the
>writing programs - Ulysses, Scrivener, Inspire Writer etc.
>
>
>>Back then, it was extremely easy to entangle
>>subdocuments. The wise Word enthusiast, at least back then, pretended
>>master document mode didn’t exist because it was deadly easy to mangle
>>documents.
>
>Master documents & subdocuments still work easily, but the vied
>switching doesn’t work as well as with the writing programs.
>
>My dislike of the Scrivener et al system of building from the
>cards/scenes, is maybe a quirk of my own that I have realised over the
>years. It feels as if it puts the emphasis on the components and takes
>it away from the whole. I have a better grasp working from the whole
>document. Word now has good outline views (much better than the other
>WPs I have tried), and I prefer to work within that. Plus doing
>development work in Mindomo and exporting/copying into the docx.
>
>>In the end, little-w words mean much more than Word, my beloved Mellel,
>>vim, or anything else. Use what works for you. If conditions are
>hostile
>>to preference, use export to docx and don’t tell what you really used.
>>;-)
>
>Agree completely
Posted by Dormouse
Dec 20, 2023 at 01:25 AM
Amontillado wrote:
>However, a note taking application alongside a nice word processor with
>an outline based navigation panel is more to my liking. The note taking
>app, for me, is like Scrivener’s research folder. The word processor’s
>navigation panel is like Scrivener’s Draft Binder - and I realize the
>Binder does a whole lot more.
Word’s navigation pane has an outline mode. The main body of the document has header folding (marginally better than most markdown editors because there are nine levels; significantly poorer than WriteMonkey 3 with its ability to fold anything on the fly); easy to work with any chosen level. Linked notes connect to a OneNote section or page in a right-hand panel. There’s a range of specialist add-ins for all types of writers (only ones I always have installed are Paperpile, Zotero, PWA and Writage).
It’s not perfect, but ticks enough boxes to make it the best option for me. Main deficiency is the lack of good visual mode - but Mindomo exports perfectly to docx and it’s easy to set up links in both directions.