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Re: Desktop look...
by Sean Russell on Friday 08/Feb/2002, @17:30
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> Abiword at least started from a stable base, i.e. the ability to do WYSIWYG printing. I can't believe anyone would
> write a word processor and not consider the ability to print the most vital feature! Don't knock Abiword, it may be
> simple - but it does the job 99% of the time.
I have to disagree. Anything that Abiword is adequate for, I've found, I might as well use vi for. Any non-trivial document I've ever written requires features not found in Abiword.
That said, KWord isn't much better. My wife, an author, can't use KWord because, as of the latest stable release, printing is still screwed up. However, at least it has styles, an absolute minimum for any document over a page or two.
One thing I *really* like about Abiword is the export to docbook. I wish KWord would adopt this. If I had more time, I'd write a couple of XSLT stylesheets to convert between the two. Actually, Abiword's export and import facilities far outshine KWords, unless you're only interested in MSWord imports, in which case KWord's is marginally better, and both are vastly inferior to StarOffice.
> For the record I use KDE2.2.2 as my desktop - but that doesn't precude me from using gnome apps if I think they're
> better for my productivity. I'm looking forward to the next release of KOffice alot, but at the moment - I'll stick
> with whats best for the job.
IMHO, unless you need rigid control over formatting, KWord is much superior to Abiword. Printing is sufficient, as long as (as I said) you aren't trying to do a resume, or something that requires true WYSIWYG.
But, in the end, StarOffice still beats the pants off of either, in both printing and features. It's a memory hog, but it is the only real alternative to MSWord for people who's jobs depend on a good word processor. |
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