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Recommend Word Processor for New Mac Accordance User


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Well. Your choise. It may look ancient. But is isn't. And even if it would be ancient, the modern things are not always the better.

 

I have gotten used to it, wrote my diploma with it and I'm writing letters and almost all other stuff with it.

Wouldn't get rid of it...

 

 

regards,

Manfred

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Has anyone used CopyWrite with Accordance? How does it handle right to left? And then how does it behave when it exports to RTF?

 

Just checking it out online, I like the project mgmt. concept.

 

Thanks,

Ross

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  • 1 month later...

Has anyone used OpenOffice -- I see that on their website (http://www.openoffice.org/dev_docs/source/sys_reqs_20.html) that they have the following specs listed as requirements: Mac OS X (X11)

 

* Power Mac G3 400Mhz or higher

* Mac OS X 10.3.x (10.3.5 recommended), Mac OS X 10.4.x

* 256Mbytes RAM

* 350Mbytes available disk space

* X11 required. Available for OS X 10.3 on Apple.com here and for OS X 10.4 on the OS X install disc. The instructions for Tiger users are here.

* 800 x 600 or higher resolution with 16.7 Million colours

 

 

What is your experience, if any with this program on the OS X platform?

 

Currently I am running a WINTEL machine utilizing the emulator to run Accordance, but looking very seriously at making the jump to the MACINTEL world.

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I don't have any experience with Open Office, but I use NeoOffice, which is a different Mac port of Open Office. Open Office has to run using the X11 windowing system. (Don't ask me to explain X11, because I really don't understand it). NeoOffice runs more natively on the Mac. The aim of the NeoOffice project is to adapt Open Office code to create "An office experience that feels like any other application on your Mac."

 

The quote is from Neo's wiki: NeoWiki You can find more information about the program there.

 

Most of my experience with NeoOffice is with Writer (the word processor). I'm still learning it's ins and outs, and sometimes struggle to figure out how to do things, but there is a fairly active support forum, and I'm willing to put up with some frustration to avoid paying big bucks for Microsoft Office. I hope that helps.

 

From the NeoOffice download page:

 

To install and run NeoOffice, you must have the following:

 

* Mac OS X 10.3 or higher

* 384 MB of memory

* 400 MB of free disk space

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I bought Mellel, but have never used it. I use Word (I don't do much Hebrew). I like it. But now I hate it under Rosetta. But Mellel is not scriptable, so is worthless to me. However, it has been the only fully-fully supported option for alot of Hebrew work.

 

NeoOffice 2.0 has just now made the beta version 3 available. The features comparison chart says:

"Support for text entry in non-Roman scripts including South Asian, East Asian, right-to-left and complex text layout scripts."

And it includes Hebrew on its list of these supported languages, so it is definitely worth a look.

NeoOffice Feature Comparison

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  • 4 months later...
I bought Mellel, but have never used it. I use Word (I don't do much Hebrew). I like it. But now I hate it under Rosetta. But Mellel is not scriptable, so is worthless to me. However, it has been the only fully-fully supported option for alot of Hebrew work.

 

Joe, what are you doing with Word that scriptability is such a major issue?

 

I'm a Mellel boy myself, and definitely looking forward to their next release. Hello cross-references!!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sorry for slow response.

Right now, I'm working on a project that dynamically creates tables based on scripture references. I have scripts which pull the texts from Accordance and format and paste them into the tables in Word. Also, I create lists of search strings, and then run those via script in Accordance and then again push the resulting content into documents.

With VB script and Applescript of Word 2004, the notion of being strapped by Mellel's lack in this department would feel like having to breath through a wet pillow case. (I've no idea where that simile came from.)

Scripting is just the way I think. I can't help it. Sorry.

I wish more folks could make use the powerful functionality possible in using scripts in their daily routine, even with Accordance. I wish I could make more scripts available publically but it takes sooo much time to get something ready to work on other people's computer and account for all the variables involved.

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Thanks for the response. There are some Mellel users who desire scriptability as well. You should voice your opinion on the Mellel forum poll in the "Nitty and Gritty" Mellel forum.

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FWIW, NeoOffice 2.1 will include support for VBA..just in Calc at first, but I think the hope is that eventually it will cover a wider range of VBA support. You can find more info here

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FWIW, NeoOffice 2.1 will include support for VBA.

I would think this is mostly a dead end. Since Word 2008 for Mac will abandon VBA, it will have no place on a Mac platform. Even in offices like mine will soon be, where most are on pc's running Latest office but the lone office with a Mac will be running Open Office or NeoOffice, it's hard to imagine that deployed VB Script will run equally on both. Perhaps forms might, at least.

The MacBU did a fantastic job of Applescript implementation with Word 2004, and that yummy goodness will only continue in Word 2008.

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I would think this is mostly a dead end. Since Word 2008 for Mac will abandon VBA, it will have no place on a Mac platform.

 

Joe,

 

what do VB and VBA stand for? Sorry for my ignorance.

 

As about Mellel, I share Danny's expectation for cross-references. It's now the developer's priority, and they have been working on it for a few months. They usually try to avoid just adding a new feature, that might conflict with others. They try to integrate it fully within the the app.

I hope we will have soon something excellent.

 

Marco

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what do VB and VBA stand for? Sorry for my ignorance.

 

Visual Basic / Visual Basic for Applications

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Joe,

what do VB and VBA stand for? Sorry for my ignorance.

Marco,

In the context of using Visual Basic (for Applications) with Microsoft Word, you can just think of it as the integrated scripting language used in Micro$oft office applications.

 

I'm not certain I know precisely what y'all are talking about when you pine for "cross-references" in Mellel.

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I'm not certain I know precisely what y'all are talking about when you pine for "cross-references" in Mellel.

 

Joe,

 

thank you for your explanations.

 

About cross-referencing in Mellel: along with indexing, dynamic cross-referencing is the most important addition to Mellel 2.2, whichshould be released within a month.

 

There is a detailed topic in the Mellel forum, subforum "The Nitty and the Gritty". You can read about it at http://forum.redlers.com/viewtopic.php?t=6...asc&start=0

 

It looks like very good news to all Mellel users who need to write a book.

 

Marco

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Yes, crossreferencing is a godsend. whenever you have those little footnotes that says "see note # below" you won't have to go through and change when you edit and delete footnotes.

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  • 3 weeks later...

For those of us still mourning the loss of Nisus Classic, Nisus have announced Nisus Pro, which looks like it will finally be bringing back many of the features lost in Express.

 

More info here: Nisus Pro Preview

 

I've been using Mellel for years, but never felt fully comfortable with it, so I'm hoping Nisus Pro will be everything I need. But then again, I'm hoping that England will win the Cricket world Cup, as well...

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For those of us still mourning the loss of Nisus Classic, Nisus have announced Nisus Pro, which looks like it will finally be bringing back many of the features lost in Express.

 

More info here: Nisus Pro Preview

 

I used the Classic version for years - the one feature I was hoping they would bring back was the "booklet" formatting. There was no need to remember how many pages, or plan ahead. I just wrote and printed and it took care of everything. Unfortunately it was dropped as part of Nisus Express (and Pro) - and still hasn't been re-instated.

 

I had issues with non availabilty of minority language spelling dictionaries for Nisus - now they rely on the OS supplying spelling. That still leaves me with minor problems but I will just have to live with it.

 

Pity about the booklet formatting - 's e sin mar a tha (that's how it is) - E

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NeoOffice 2.1 is due out March 27... the continued development of NeoOffice is Extremely promising for us.

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Actually, you can get it now if you are willing to pay a little something for it. ($25 until March 13; $10 Between March 13 and 27, after that it's free, although donations are always welcome.).

 

Since I posted in this thread last fall, NeoOffice has come a long way. I'm quite pleased with it; I don't miss either MS Word or AppleWorks.

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  • 5 months later...

For my word processing I use both Pages & NeoOffice. Pages will help you develop really professional documents very easily, & NeoOffice offers POWERFUL original language font support & document technology. NeoOffice is really great & it's free. You'll love working with it.

 

Eventually I hope to write a powerful word processor app that takes advantage of the original language unicode fonts of today. We'll see what happens.

 

Nathan

 

I am dedicating this machine to Accordance and to Bible study. So I need to hear from veteran users what they consider the finest word processor, especially for Greek and Hebrew texts. It also needs to be somewhat Microsoft (can I use that word on this forum?) compatible (i.e. files which can be read by MSWord - my laptop is PC). I have heard of Word for Mac, Mellel, and Note Bene. What suggestions can you give me.

 

I know that Mellel is probably a better word processor for Hebrew et al....but, just to put forth another name besides Word, Mellel and Nisus, I would recommend Mariner Write. I have to say that I like it very much. It is very intuitive and seems to handle any imported text from Accordance very well. They have a demo at http://www.marinersoftware.com/sitepage.php?page=12. It is a very fast, small footprint, economical word processor with good support. Give it a try.

 

pr dave speers

dspeers@altamont.net

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  • 3 months later...

I just started using Mellel and it is unbelievable! I downloaded most of the recommendations from this particular forum and liked using Mellel the best with Accordance. Thanks for all the recommendations here ladies and gentleman!

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  • 2 months later...

I second the vote for NeoOffice -- Now on version 2.2, it's become super mature, is quite powerful, and plays well with other languages. Now with support for those annoying Office 2007 document formats.

 

Oh, and did I mention that it's free? If you haven't checked it out yet, you owe it to yourself (neoOffice.org)

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  • 4 weeks later...

I finally switched back to Office 2004 & now I'm on Office 2008. There's just a few things I couldn't do in NeoOffice so I went with the real thing. If you can get by on NeoOffice than I'd just use it since it's free & you won't have to worry about upgrading to new expensive packages, just download the free update. If you have to go with Office then it works really well as a word processor. Word 2008 has seemed really nice so far. Of course, for everything I can I use iWork, as it's my favorite app. iWork '08 has been really amazing.

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  • 1 month later...

I hope this thread isn't dead. It seems to go back a decent amount in time.

 

Anyway, As far as word processors go, the real question is what are you using it for?

 

For church bulletins and stuff, I use Pages. It still needs to mature some as a word processor, but it works fine for my needs.

 

For papers, sermons and most everything else, I use XeTeX . It produces functional output with english, greek and hebrew. But the real advantage is the ability to write first and then format later. I used to spend an extra hour writing my sermons just playing with the fonts and colors instead of writing. Now, I write first and make it pretty after. It saves some time.

 

These things are a matter of individual preference. But I use XeTeX because it's pretty, efficient and free.

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  • 1 year later...

Instead of starting a new topic I wondered if there were any updated news among the different Text editors out there. I'm currently using Pages 08 but spend half my time getting distracted by tweaking the document rather than writing it.

 

Any new news on word processors? Likes/Dislikes?

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