Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!waikato.ac.nz!canterbury!cctr132
From: cctr132@csc.canterbury.ac.nz (Nick FitzGerald, CSC, Uni. of Canterbury, NZ)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.misc
Subject: Re: Need Recommendations for Buying a PC
Message-ID: <1991Mar30.221031.360@csc.canterbury.ac.nz>
Date: 30 Mar 91 10:10:31 GMT
References: <1991Mar29.100252.105@gnv.ifas.ufl.edu> <1991Mar29.231651.22990@d.cs.okstate.edu>
Organization: University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
Lines: 88

Not wanting to start wp/editor flame-war 3000 but I'll add my two cents . . .

In article <1991Mar29.231651.22990@d.cs.okstate.edu>, ong@d.cs.okstate.edu
(ONG ENG TENG) writes:
> From article <1991Mar29.100252.105@gnv.ifas.ufl.edu>, by
sjs@gnv.ifas.ufl.edu:
>> I've used WordPerfect and Word (DOS version), and I prefer Word.  It's
>> too easy in WP to trip over those stupid imbedded codes, accidently delete
>> codes (like column format), or end up with codes being duplicated thousands
>> of times.  Or, if you move the cursor over one too many spaces in WP, you
>> can end up beyond or in the middle of some format you didn't mean to
>> be in.

I _generally_ agree with these sentiments, but will add that I started with
Word (so there may be some kind of bias there).  Personally, I found WP
extraordinarily difficult to come to terms with - I have to support users of
both in my job.  OK, WP is more complex and has more features than Word
(generally a good reason to _not_ buy software - nowadays "more features"
usually means that something is trying to be too many things to too many
people), but I find most things that Word can do, are more easily attained.

> There are mainly three ways a piece of software can become
> popular -- 1) its predecessor is popular, like DOS 2.x, DOS 3.x, DOS 4.x and
> so on; 2) put on a big publicity campaign, like Windows 3.0;
> 3) is really the best!  Since WordPerfect 4.2 (the predecessor to 5.0 and 5.1)
> was not the most popular in its time (Wordstar was), and WordPerfect Corp did
> not put out a big publicity campaign (as far as I know), then its got
> to be really good.  

Agree with 1) but poor example and 2), but 3) (and hence the conclusion about
WP) is ambiguous/wrong.  What does "best" mean?  WP is most popular in the US
because of its user-support - end of story.  It is not as outrageously popular
elsewhere, where the support is not as comprehensive.  To me this suggests
that whatever "best" may mean, there are similarly "good" word processors out
there.
 
> Sorry for sayin this, but you have problem with the "stupid" embedded codes
> because you are not careful.  I am not careful too sometimes and do
> some damage to my document, but that is not the fault of the word processor,
> it is my own.  In fact, the more "complicated" a word processor is, 
> the more powerful it is.  And WP 5.1 is extremely powerful.  

Agree.  If you do _any_ formatting in WP and don't use Reveal Codes mode you
are just asking for the sort of problems the earlier poster described.

> Your reason for choosing Word over WP is not WP's fault, its yours.
> The few reasons I can fault a word processor is if it does not
> provide certain features even if I would go the mile to execute it.

Now we get down to it.  The "best" word processor (or any other app) is the
one that contains most/all of the features that you require/desire.  The
reality is that for any given app the "best" may end up being a combination
of two or more products.  Personally, the things that WP is good at, that
Word can't do (or not as well) that I want/would like are the sort of things
I'd much rather spend NZ$1000 (or more) on a "proper" DTP program to get
rather than put up with WP's clunky, arcane and often mind-boggling
implementations.  WP 5.1 wasn't out when I bought my copy of Word 5.0, and
I'm not going to change now.

> So far, I have no such complaint with Word Perfect, though I 
> have not delibrately try to find fault with it. 
> 
> p.s. I have spent hundreds of hours on WP, working with columns and
>      overlapping graphic images, etc.  One document I am working on now
>      is 1.1MB!

Consider yourself lucky!  Several users that I am the first line of support
for have chronic problems with WP 5.0 and 5.1 corrupting their document
files.  (No, it is not user error.  I'm hesitant to say it's a bug, as it's
one of those things that happens often enough to be "well known", but is not
reproducible.)  Further I don't know why people have stuck with WP since 4.2
(and earlier) - 5.0 couldn't correctly read a large proportion of 4.2
documents, and I have a 5.0 document that 5.1 can't cope with, despite what
the manual says.  I do actually - it's the same reason that so many people
stuck with WordStar when it had clearly fallen far behind the other word
processors - after having invested so much time into learning the beast,
people weren't going to change easily.

In its current incarnation WP is trying to be "too much for too many" - its
formatting system and character based display/interface make it clumsy for
many of the things that it can do, but maybe the Windows version due out
mid-year will make much more of its potential _easily_ accessible.   (If
the kludge that is its current mouse/pull-down menu interface is anything to
go by though, I wouldn't hold my breath.)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Nick FitzGerald, PC Applications Consultant, CSC, Uni of Canterbury, N.Z. 
 Internet: n.fitzgerald@csc.canterbury.ac.nz        Phone: (64)(3) 642-337