Would anyone on this forum like to comment on Writing Outliner for MS Word? I've downloaded a trial version, played with it an hour or so, and find it most intruding. Does anyone know if it works with very long documents, thereby solving the infamous Master Documents problem in MS Word.

I'm not sure what you mean about "intruding" (intrusive?) - the WO menu can be minimised to the left of the screen at any time. I use WO extensively including for a graphics-heavy document which is over 2500 pages long - I chose it because it could handle long documents by splitting them up during editing.

It works well in Word 2007. It works less well in Word 2013 - it has to be activated every time I want to use is (the add-in is disabled when Word is closed each time) and it was less stable producing large documents. The developer is working on a new version. Until that's ready I go back to Word 2007 to output the problem document.

Hope that helps.

Graham

Oops! Spelling mistake. I meant intriguing, that is, interesting.

I used it 2 years ago, until Scrivener for Windows appeared. I found it cumbersome, slow, and buggy.

basilides wrote:

Does anyone know if it works with very long
documents, thereby solving the infamous Master Documents problem in MS
Word.

If your main need is to organise a master outline (a clickable table of contents) for chapters that are in separate Word files, you could use Freeplane in outline mode in the left half of your screen, drag and drop the Word files into Freeplane, and view them in Word in the right half of your screen.

I have been using it from the very beginning (now in Word 2010), had very fruitful discussion with the developer concerning directions of further development some time ago and can recommend it with the clear conscience :)

I am intrigued by it, and I could buy it for $29 even today (sale extended). The developer seems to have several projects; it seems to me there would be a big market for such a program if it added value to what Word by itself is capable of, but:

- It does not seem to be able to move tree entries? I thought that was the core idea of an outliner? What is this tool after if moving parts around is not possible?

- What does it do? What does it do what the integrated outline function does not do? Am I right in saying the integrated outliner replicates the titles/subtitles structure of ONE Word document, and this tool does the same, but combining several Word documents with their respective structures, or by integrating them within an overall structure?

- As for slowness and bugginess, that might have been improved in 2 years.

22111 wrote:

I am intrigued by it, and I could buy it for $29 even today (sale
extended). The developer seems to have several projects; it seems to me
there would be a big market for such a program if it added value to what
Word by itself is capable of, but:

- It does not seem to be able to move tree entries? I thought that was
the core idea of an outliner? What is this tool after if moving parts
around is not possible?

You can move entries just by drag and drop.

- What does it do? What does it do what the integrated outline function
does not do? Am I right in saying the integrated outliner replicates the
titles/subtitles structure of ONE Word document, and this tool does the
same, but combining several Word documents with their respective
structures, or by integrating them within an overall structure?

As I mentioned, it allows me to handle massive documents in Word. Opening a 2500 page document in Word, moving to the right place and making edits is slow and annoying. With WO I have split each chapter into a seperate "document" within WO, which I can then open and edit quickly and easily. When I want to output the full document, I can compile all the individual documents into one big one. That's what it does for me.

- As for slowness and bugginess, that might have been improved in 2
years.

The developer is working on a whole new version, so apart from adding Word 2013 compatibility, there has been no other development in WO for some time.

Graham

I see, and I did not want to spread false info.

On bitsdujour, Peter Martin wrote:

If only one has the ability to sort the titles (left side) then I would say it is perfect.

which was left uncommented by the developer there, so I falsely assumed the entries could not be moved; it now appears Martin wanted to say (I suppose) "sort automatically, alphanumerically" or something along this line.

So if I understand well:

- you have several Word files

- you "import" those into a "project" of this tool

- then, another day, you load this "project", which in reality means the tool will load all the corresponding Word files, and present their structures within a "compound" tree, as if all these separate files were one file, and which also means there would be a virtual, global structure, in which subtitle 3.5.2 of file 12 would be item 5.8.2 within this overall structure?

- within this overall structure, you click on any entry, and you gain access to the respective Word document, at the respective position (hence a click on entry 5.8.2 would "open" document 12 at subtitle 3.5.2 in this example)?

- also, within this overall structure, you freely move parts around, as it was one single file, which means if you move around point 1.3.4 after point 12.5.6, in the tree, in the actual files the corresponding part would be deleted in one file and rewritten at the correct position within another of these files?

If my above assumptions are right now, I think this should be a tremendous piece of software.

Graham Rhind wrote:

As I mentioned, it allows me to handle massive documents in Word.
Opening a 2500 page document in Word, moving to the right place and
making edits is slow and annoying. With WO I have split each chapter
into a seperate "document" within WO, which I can then open and edit
quickly and easily. When I want to output the full document, I can
compile all the individual documents into one big one. That's what it
does for me.

There are two elephants in the room. The one is Word, the other is Scrivener for Windows.

1) Why use Word at all, if Word can't even handle its own files when they get big?

2) How does Word Outliner compare to Scrivener? The last time I looked at both, Scrivener appeared to have more going for it.

Of course the utility of both depend on one's workflow as well. As a writer, I've decided to separate the writing process and the formatting process. I still use Word for formatting as the very last stage, but otherwise I prefer to use single-pane outliners with inline notes that allow me to write fast (and I don't find writing in either Scrivener or Word fast enough).

By "fast" I mean the least possible delay in typing, copying and pasting, scrolling through a large document, jumping from section to section, collapsing and expanding sections, moving sections around, without the thing crashing on me or telling me to wait...

I realise that some other workflows may require the use of Word at an earlier stage of the process (but personally I'd try to eliminate those and delay getting involved with Word until the latest possible stage).

WO keeps all relevant Word files within a single SQLite database file. This is convenient, but apparently has led to some problems in the past (in particular when storing the database in Dropbox). The new product will use the file system for the same purpose:
http://writingoutliner.com/writing-software/blog/news-about-the-succeed-product-of-writing-outliner-projectfolders/

That said, with the exception of the Dropbox issue, and judging from Graham's experience, the current program seems overall safe and stable. I expect that there will be a modest upgrade pricing to the new product when it is released, so the Bits du Jour offer should still make sense.

I forgot to mention, and assuming my description above is correct:

Any cross-reference between parts of text will be upheld and updated? Even when before, a reference was within a physical file and now is from one physical file into another, or vice versa? This would be splendid functionality... or is this idea just dreaming of things not being realized yet? No outliner of my knowledge offers such functionality, which might explain why scientific publications continue to be written in Word?

- I should add that in my description above, I assumed that moving around entries within the tree also moves around any "entries" (together with their physical file parts) that are indented "under" those entries, like in any traditional outliner. (And I hope this assumption is correct?)

- I understand considerations with regard to speed and stability, but all I know is that Scrivener does not handle any cross-referencing and will probably never do, since its target audience is not academic writing, but that cross-referencing within Word is possible, within ONE Word file at least, hence my question if WO is able to manage such cross-referencing on this broader "project" scope even, which would be quite fantastic.

Thank you for this info and this link, which is very instructive. "ProjectFolders" is a very good name, and "ProjectFolders add-in will greatly utilize a tagging system for file management, this approach has been proven by Gmail, EverNote, etc." seems to be a very smart move, marketing-wise, albeit not being on purpose for academic writing, so I fear if "total cross-referencing" is not within the current version, it will probably be not in future versions either, since what can be found at your link seems to indicate quite another direction of development.

@22111 Yes, this is more or less correct. Nothing is really physically moved as such when you drag things around except the order that WO knows the files needs to be handled in when you output the data into a new (full) Word file. I don't know about referencing (not something I need or use) and yes, when you drag a branch, it takes the children with it.

@DrAndus: it's horses for courses. I've never had an issue with Word (except its first incarnations in the 1990s, but that's ancient history) and I need very complex formatting from the very start. I'm not writing in WO, I'm managing documents. Word's the only word processor I've ever come across which can handle the file sizes I need with the formatting and stability I, likewise, need, so I don't feel the need to look for another tool. But WO saves me a lot of time and grief so for me it's ideal. It may not suit everybody, naturally ... :-)

Graham

22111 wrote:

I see, and I did not want to spread false info.

On bitsdujour, Peter Martin wrote:

If only one has the ability to sort the titles (left side) then I would
say it is perfect.

which was left uncommented by the developer there, so I falsely assumed
the entries could not be moved; it now appears Martin wanted to say (I
suppose) "sort automatically, alphanumerically" or something along this
line.

So if I understand well:

- you have several Word files

- you "import" those into a "project" of this tool

- then, another day, you load this "project", which in reality means the
tool will load all the corresponding Word files, and present their
structures within a "compound" tree, as if all these separate files were
one file, and which also means there would be a virtual, global
structure, in which subtitle 3.5.2 of file 12 would be item 5.8.2 within
this overall structure?

- within this overall structure, you click on any entry, and you gain
access to the respective Word document, at the respective position
(hence a click on entry 5.8.2 would "open" document 12 at subtitle 3.5.2
in this example)?

- also, within this overall structure, you freely move parts around, as
it was one single file, which means if you move around point 1.3.4 after
point 12.5.6, in the tree, in the actual files the corresponding part
would be deleted in one file and rewritten at the correct position
within another of these files?

If my above assumptions are right now, I think this should be a
tremendous piece of software.

Graham Rhind wrote:

@DrAndus: it's horses for courses. I've never had an issue with Word
(except its first incarnations in the 1990s, but that's ancient history)
and I need very complex formatting from the very start. I'm not writing
in WO, I'm managing documents. Word's the only word processor I've ever
come across which can handle the file sizes I need with the formatting
and stability I, likewise, need, so I don't feel the need to look for
another tool. But WO saves me a lot of time and grief so for me it's
ideal. It may not suit everybody, naturally ... :-)

Fair enough - we seem to be using Word for very different purposes (and it's not impossible that there is something in my own system config that makes Word seem sluggish and crash occasionally). I was just curious what WO brings to the party. Thanks for clarifying.

"Nothing is really physically moved as such when you drag things around except the order that WO knows the files needs to be handled in when you output the data into a new (full) Word file."

Thank you for your clarifications, but you also say, you do not write in WO, which should mean you navigate in the WO tree, but then you write within the physical Word files that are displayed by this navigation. I have tremendous difficulty to imagine WO leaving these physical Word files intact when you make some (not physically replicated) moves from within the tree, then moves of parts of text from your editing the physical files, and what when the latter are not bound to specific titles/subtitles ranges, but overlap with such? I't very easy for me, though, to image total chaos that would quickly be created by this.

Perhaps WO does not update the physical files but at the end of your work session or such, but leaving them unchanged for months, in spite of your perhaps total physical overhaul of most of them, by editing the physical files, in-between?

If what you say is correct, the synchronization between Word and WO might be less stringent than I had imagined; I could also devise a rather light system in which it's just the title/subtitle structure (and their possible renames) that is constantly processed / synched, but well, is this really enough?

Perhaps yes; this is a totally new concept for the execution of such a task; perhaps I thought about this in too traditional a way. Highly interesting subject to reflect upon.

But if I understand well, this deliberate abstention from implementing "real programming power" then implies the "destructive" running of sort of a macro which once and for all will put "everything" into a global physical file, but from which point on cannot be split up, except for doing it again, manually, with new files, into its original component files.

From what I read there, WO preserves footnotes; the technically much more complicated cross-references not being mentioned an rather improbable that WO could manage them this way, even once and for all then.

I had of course assumed WO was the easy way to shuffle around your text parts within a global "project" (which, when done manually, is a lot of work, but would not technically interfere with rebuilding a global outline for all these, then, each time, but the way you describe it.

I understand much better now why WO has not yet been sold to every Word user, but there is a certain probability the developer is transferring his tool to a file system based tool exactly for this reason, in order to shift the physical parts together with your tree moves, a thing the Word outline, for a single file, does, of course, so at any moment, your things are in a "proper state".

Anyway, this is very intriguing software, but which I'll not buy yet, this time, knowing this very strange detail.

@2211 I think you're getting confused/I'm confusing you. Let me try to clarify below.

22111 wrote:

"Nothing is really physically moved as such when you drag things around
except the order that WO knows the files needs to be handled in when you
output the data into a new (full) Word file."

Thank you for your clarifications, but you also say, you do not write in
WO, which should mean you navigate in the WO tree, but then you write
within the physical Word files that are displayed by this navigation.

Exactly right. When I wrote "write" I meant I do not "author" in them, i.e. I don't write my books from scratch using WO. But there's no reason why you couldn't - it's just not how I use it.

I
have tremendous difficulty to imagine WO leaving these physical Word
files intact when you make some (not physically replicated) moves from
within the tree, then moves of parts of text from your editing the
physical files, and what when the latter are not bound to specific
titles/subtitles ranges, but overlap with such? I't very easy for me,
though, to image total chaos that would quickly be created by this.

I'm not sure what you're getting at here. You should view WO as something like a set of chapter headings. You click on the chapter you want to work with, you then work in the Word document. You can move on to another chapter and make changes there. Nothing you have edited is lost. From within WO you save your project and that saves all the changes you've made in each "document". The reason I'm being careful in what I say is because each "chapter" in WO isn't a Word document which you can access with Windows Explorer, for example - as mentioned, it's kept in a database. I understand databases - you don't move records physically within them, you alter the metadata. Don't worry if you don't understand that - it's not important. That's just how the underlying program works. You should just view each section/line/chapter/whatever in the WO tree as a separate document which is part of a project, and you can edit them all separately, move them and bring them all together. Nothing complicated or chaotic about it.

IF you need to make project-wide edits they you need to export your document from WO into a full Word document then edit that final document in Word. I do this for my 2500 page document. For example, after export I give do the page numbering and title formatting because I want them to work for the whole (big) document.

Perhaps WO does not update the physical files but at the end of your
work session or such, but leaving them unchanged for months, in spite of
your perhaps total physical overhaul of most of them, by editing the
physical files, in-between?

It does update them, you save the changes, I've never lost data in WO. No problem.

If what you say is correct, the synchronization between Word and WO
might be less stringent than I had imagined;

There is no synchronisation. You are working directly in Word and the WO component manages the navigation and the metadata (which chapter you are editing, which order it is written, how it is output in the project etc.)

I had of course assumed WO was the easy way to shuffle around your text
parts within a global "project"

Yes, that's about it. You can do this also in many other programs such as Scrivener or TreeProjects or Whizfolders. I use WO because it gives me the same possibilities and includes all Word's power.

I hope that makes it clear/ I think you're over analysing the program and what it does. But I'm not here to sell it to you ... if it doesn't suit your working methods, it would be better to choose an alternative.

Graham

Thank you very much for these explanations. I let pass this occasion, but no need to "sell" this tool to me, I continue, all the more so after your final post, to consider it as highly intriguing and well worth a deeper look.

I suppose I've made the mistake to not abstract enough from the physical Word files, replicated within the MO database; I mean by this I have always those physical Word files that must / should / perhaps do not exist besides these database bits, and which are, from what we now know, must be completely out of synch with their ordered counterparts within the database - or perhaps those physical files don't even exist anymore, in the meantime, and are literally replaced by those database bits, and any "work" on those files is then done by this tool presenting you a (one only) dummy Word file, into which it puts the text part from the database that is needed at that given moment?

Anyway, the developer's switching back his tool to files in the file system seems to indicate that on the technical level he is concerned with, he encounters some problems in the line of those I imagine here, and your relating this tool works faultlessly, even in its current form, with a 2,500 page document, proves he is doing brilliant work even now. I am much eager to discover the new version of his tool, even if I do not work with 4-digit page number Word files.

Also, there have been some similar add-ons for Word - I should have a look into my notes to better remember, but this one seems to be the one of those that is in active, and real smart, development. Thumbs up, decidedly!