Re: Update

[Peter Knupfer pknupfer@xxxxxxxx]

Stephen Shaw's gentle rebuke to TTG is right on the mark and should be
considered very seriously by this company. And I suspect that it has been
discussed before on this list. I have been using XY since III+ came out,
and I can think of no other national-market word processor that is
advertised and supported as weakly as XyWrite. TTG apparently prefers to
depend upon unofficial networks of programmers and advanced users such as
this one to handle problems with the software. One result is that XY and
XW have not been well-received by the mainstream PC software community;
that cross-platform adaptibility and simple automated routines are ignored
by XW developers, who seem to have no connection to the general using
public (as opposed to advanced programmers such as this group). I remember
the review of XW in one of the big PC mags last yr. Naturally, the
magazine gave oodles of space to the ones that dominate the market, and a
backhanded sidebar about XW that criticized its dull, text-driven
environment. I sent in a dissent to the reviewer, who replied that XW,
despite its many strengths, still confines itself to a tiny niche of the
word proc market and isn't in touch with the general user. And none of the
mags I had browsed ever referred to this program, offered any tips or tech
advice about it, or mentioned ways that a person working in an environment
dominated by the more popular programs could work out ways for XW and the
other programs to communicate.

I'll bet that many of us would like TTG and XW to keep its cozy community
of users together, but that has exacted a price, IMHO. On many occasions I
have been close to jumping ship to a word processor with stronger technical
support and smoother integration with other programs. Daniel Say has
located some web sites and usenet groups that mention XY/XW, but one should
not need to surf the web to get official answers to basic questions about a
program in which one has invested a good chunk of change. When I have
raised this question with tech support at TTG, they have shrugged it off,
saying that TTG just doesn't like to invest in advertising -- yet that
policy is an important deterrent to current and potential users, who wonder
year to year if this program is going to survive and the company can be
relied upon.

Peter Knupfer