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From: csaron@ucbopal.BERKELEY.EDU (Aron Roberts)
Newsgroups: net.micro.pc
Subject: Re: WordPerfect vs MS-Word
Message-ID: <328@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Mon, 17-Feb-86 15:43:10 EST
Article-I.D.: ucbjade.328
Posted: Mon Feb 17 15:43:10 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 21-Feb-86 04:12:04 EST
References: <506@imsvax.UUCP> <1270@osu-eddie.UUCP> <3670@utah-cs.UUCP> <129@fritz.UUCP>
Sender: network@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: csaron@ucbopal.UUCP (Aron Roberts)
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Lines: 72
Keywords: Microsoft Word SSI WordPerfect comparison features
In-Reply-To: <3682@utah-cs.UUCP>



In article <3682@utah-cs.UUCP> halff@utah-cs.UUCP (Henry M. Halff) writes:
>
>Does Word:
>Have a thesaurus?  
  No.  (An add-on, third-party product is required, at extra
  cost.  One example might be Turbo Lightning, which works with
  Word and other word processing programs.  Additional third-
  party products are required to give Word some of the built-
  in capabilities of WordPerfect, as indicated in several
  comments below.) 
>Keep page boundary indicators current?
  No, and one of the most frustrating features of Word for
  users who are used to WordStar, WordPerfect, etc.  Word
  uses a gallery format, which allows it to rapidly load
  and edit LARGE files (I've worked with a 2MB Word file on
  an IBM PC/XT without noticable slowing from Word's usual
  editing speed on average-sized files (1-50KB)).  The
  tradeoff for this is that Word does not continually update
  page breaks; one must manually request repagination 
  (recalculation and redisplay of page breaks), which is SLOW.  
  Word minimizes the associated problems by allowing paragraphs
  to be designated as "keep lines together" or "keep with
  next paragraph," thus automatically keeping whole paragraphs, 
  tables, etc. together on a page; keeping headings together with 
  the text they describe, and so on.  Word also has built-in "widow"
  and "orphan" control.  
>Handle columns? In a WYSIWYG fashion?
  Yes to the former, no to the latter.
>Have math capabilities?
  No, but Sidekick and other RAM-resident calculators can  
  partly make up for this lack (and are easier to use than
  WordPerfect's built-in math features).
>Have interactive macros?
  No, closest is Word's glossary feature or the (extra cost)
  use of an add-on keyboard macro processor of the Superkey/
  Prokey/Smartkey genre.
>Have document conversion facilities for DCF, DIF, Wordstar?
  Yes (to be supported by Microsoft in the future; to my
  knowledge, not yet implemented in Word 2.0; no to DIF, yes
  to WordStar - one-way only, WordStar-to-Word (except via
  ASCII files).
>Have a merge facility?
  Yes, an excellent one.
>Have automatic table of contents & indexing facilities?
  No.
>Have redline and strikeout capabilities?
  I don't know what "redline" means; yes to strikeout, including
  on-screen display of strikeout text with IBM CGA or EGA or 
  Hercules Graphics Card.
>Online reference?
  Yes.  (And much better than Word Perfect's, in my opinion.)
>Escape to DOS?
  Yes, through the Library menu choice. 

Caveat - It's been a while since I worked with Word on an
IBM PC.  I now use Word exclusively on a Macintosh.  Hence,
some of the above may be wholly or partially inaccurate.

These are both excellent word processing programs,
reflecting different design philosophies.  WordPerfect is a
better value, but Word offers some features, such as multiple
windows, mouse editing, style sheets, and advanced formatting
and text display (WYSIWYG) that WordPerfect lacks.  

----------------------------------------------------------------
   Aron Roberts (csaron@ucbopal.UUCP) 
   Tolman Microcomputer Facility, 1535 Tolman Hall
   University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 (415) 642-2251
   UCB disclaims responsibility for opinions like these!
   "No regrets, Coyote, we just come from such different  ..."