Writer's Paradise discussion

What software do you use when you write?
SKH

Microsoft word is what I use, it's the most common I think

And if you go here you can download a set of templates for formatting screenplays, used in conjunction with Word. Not sure if it works with Word 2007 though.

If you want the ones for formatting novels and short stories, let me now your email address and I'll send you the files (they seem to have vanished from the BBC site).

Paul wrote: "And if you go here you can download a set of templates for formatting screenplays, used in conjunction with Word. Not sure if it works with Word 2007 though.

If you want the ones for formatting n..."

Thanks Paul. sandra.khorn@gmail.com

OK Sandra, I sent you the whole lot. You probably only need the ones withthe word 'prose' in them. There's a UK version and a US version, so I'm guessing you want the latter, but it won't hurt to load them all into the template directory.

There is also the free alternative to MS Office or MS Word

OpenOffice

For those who have Apple Mac's, there is

NeoOffice... a Mac interface compliant version of OpenOffice.

There are commercial packages for the Mac as well.

The ones my partner and I use are;

Scriviner

CopyWrite

StoryMill

... and the list goes on.

Gwendolyn wrote: "There is also the free alternative to MS Office or MS Word

OpenOffice

For those who have Apple Mac's, there is

NeoOffice... a Mac interface compliant version of OpenOffice.

There are commerci..."
Thank you so much

Sandra wrote: "Gwendolyn wrote: "There is also the free alternative to MS Office or MS Word

OpenOffice

For those who have Apple Mac's, there is

NeoOffice... a Mac interface compliant version of OpenOffice.

..."

Help me understand why this is better than Word? I downloaded it but it looks the same.

Um... because basically it's free ... so you don't have to pay a gazillion bucks for every major release?

... and for Mac Users, the User interface actually behaves like a Mac user interface and not a migrated windows product ... and it doesn't hang and crash like MS office tends to do.

... and it has a whole developer community behind it, which means lots of plug-in' and add-on' apps that also don't cost $$$.

... and yes, it does all the same stuff and it's compliant which means documents are interchangeable

... so you can send them to people who paid a gazillion bucks for their MS Office upgrades and read theirs in return...

Microsoft products cost money? Really?

I've had free (legal) copies for so long, I'd forgotten that.

Lucky you. :)

I use Microsoft Word and Open Office for short stories and poetry and all those things. I also use it for final drafts and for editing novels. For writing my first draft (especially for NaNoWriMo) I use yWriter.

I use Microsoft Word for everything . . .

Right now, I wouldn't go back to using Microsoft Word (or Windows XP or Vista) if someone paid me to do so!

I've been using ubuntu for some time instead of wearisome windows, and it works like a dream. Open office allows me to save anything in the same format as MS Word, plus it hasn't played up once since I installed it! With MS Word, that would happen at least a couple of times a week, almost giving me keybord-phobia!

I wrote my own software to write my book. Click here to read about it.

I just found out about another tool called ywriter, which also looks really interesting. Novello does things slightly differently. If there's any interest I will make my Novello program available for free too.

I just use Word with the BBC ScriptSmart macro overlay. Works fine, formats for UK or US filmscripts and novels, reduces the common tasks to simple keystrokes. And it's free.

OK, it doesn't work too well with Office 2007, but at home I still use Office 2000, so it's fine.

Although, now having read about it, Novello sounds quite interesting as well.

I'll have a think about trialling that...