Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!ndcheg!ndmath!deh
From: deh@ndmath.UUCP (David Hurtubise)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Tools for writing manuals...
Message-ID: <1485@ndmath.UUCP>
Date: 17 Jul 89 19:18:01 GMT
References: <1182@io.UUCP>
Organization: Math. Dept., Univ. of Notre Dame
Lines: 35

From article <1182@io.UUCP>, by bri@io.UUCP (Brian Shanblatt x3385):
> Probably not good for writing manuals for publication, but

I have to disagree.  I think it would do the job quite nicely.
And you don't have to learn something as complicated as TeX.

> Excellence! seems like a nice Word processing package. 
> 
> Anyone have experience with it?

     I've been using Excellence! ever since it came out, and it's hard
to think of anything bad to say about the package.  It handels fonts, 
IFF pictures, it can do simple page layouts, it has a dictionary, a
thesauras, and a grammer checker.  It can generate an index, and a table
of contents.  It can run in high res (interlaced) or low res mode.  And I
have yet to find a bug in the program. 
     However, Excellence! is incredibly slow.  If you've ever used Micro-
soft Word, Excellence! could really test your patience.  Since it's a what
you see is what you get type of word processor, you can't expect it to be
as fast as say, Scribble!, but I can't help but think that there must be some
way to speed it up a bit.  Also, it does not have a math mode which is a real
bummer.  The only way I can think to do symbols like integral signs or such
would be to design a special font set of math symbols or to draw them with
a paint progams and then load them in as graphics.  
     Now that I think of it, is there a font set of math symbols in the public
domain - say on a fish disk or such?  Even though having a math font set
is not nearly as good as having a math mode (like on Microsoft Word), it would
help.


------------------------
David Hurtubise
Math Department
University of Notre Dame
deh@ndmath.math.nd.edu