Re: Is XY-Write a word-processor or a text editor?

["Steve Hayes" khanyaiis@xxxxxxxx]

On 11 Dec 00, at 20:02, Michael Edwards wrote:

>   Put simply: Is XY-Write a full-featured word-processor, with various
> formatting capacities, or is it simply a text editor, producing only
> pure-text files? I've always thought it was a proper word-processor and
> never thought to question that. (Indeed, I have read the seemingly
> extravagant claim that it is the world's best word-processor, and I think
> that's what interested me about it in the first place.) But when I
> mentioned it to my brother, who is a computer professional, and therefore
> presumably knows what he is talking about, he said he was sure that
> XY-Write was only a fancy text editor, not a real word-processor.

XyWrite is a word processor, and the best word processor in the world.

You may also use it as a text editor, but it does far more than that.

Your brother seems to be confusing word processors with "suites", that is,
"do everything" programs that include a word processing capabilities, but
will also send faxes, keep your diary, provide you with cartoons, waste your
time undoing things that the program wants you to do but you don't want to do
(like underlining URLs and printing them in blue, or in dull half-tone if you
have a monochrome printer, as if anyone could "click" on a hard copy
document) and generally waste your hard disk space with a lot of stuff that
you don't really need and hardly ever use.

XyWrite is a word processor.

It is designed to *process words* as its primary function, not DTP, not
faxing, and not all the bells and whistles that in other products are more
important than the main function.

The version I use (3 plus, 13 years old) has the following functions that are
not yet available, or don't work as well, in other word processors available
on the market today:

* redlining - works better than MS Word and Lotus WordPro. In Wordperfect the
function is so primitive that the program might as well not have it. It can
delete deleted text (ie convert it back to normal), which Word and WordPro
can't do.

* footnotes - three levels of footnotes, which can be converted to endnotes
and back with a single command - try that in any of of the other programs -
if they can do it at all, it's horribly clunky.

* index - up to 10 levels of index or tables of contents.

* copy and move text - does this more easily than any other word processor,
without cumbersome "cutting" and "pasting". This is the primary word
"processing" function, and one at which XyWrite excels. It works especially
well with a keyboard with the function keys on the left where God intended
them to be, instead of the ergonomically-challenged "enhanced" keyboards of
today.

* delete line - most so-called "word processors" sold today omit this
essential word processing function, and you have to write a macro to do it.

* automatic numbering - maybe the other WP programs can do this, but by the
time I've figured out how to do it they've brought out a new version and one
has to start learning all over again.

Conclusion:

XyWrite is a word processor, and it is simply the best word processor ever.
It concentrates on one function, and it does it well.

If you compare it with a motor vehicle, if you want a vehicle for everyday
use, you can get a station waggon, which is like XyWrite. Or you can buy a
100-seater double decker bus and convert it into a motorhome, with 50 seats,
a toilet, a kitchen, a TV and video recorder, etc. No, you can't cook a meal
in the station waggon, but for taking the kids to school and picking up the
groceries, it's a lot less hassle.


Keep well,

Steve Hayes
E-mail: shayes@xxxxxxxx
  Web: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/steve.htm