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If you still experience problems with RTF files, please file a bug at http://bugzilla.abisource.com/. We will make sure it is fixed if we can do.

Okay, I'm looking at the latest version of Abiword.

It now has rudimentary header and footer support coming in. But it can't do tables, footnotes, endnotes, indexes, tables of contents, custom named styles, label printing, envelopes, or mail merging.

Couldn't the DOS versions of Word and WordPerfect do this ten years ago? Heck, didn't most word processors (with the exception of graphical ones on the Amiga) do nearly all of those things in 1987?

What exactly is AbiWord usable for right now? One-off letters to grandma? Have any the people here "impressed" with AbiWord ever written an academic paper? I remember needing to have footnotes and include tables (at least as attachments) in papers I wrote 13 years ago in my first year of college.

Even someone whose business is mowing lawns expects their word processor to be able to do a mail merge. Sure, I guess you can take AbiWord's XML document files, insert some custom tags with some other editor, and write a Perl program to perform a mail merge for you, but if you consider that a "solution", you probably don't believe in WYSIWYG word processors in the first place. Ditto making all tables externally in a spreadsheet--with mediocre formatting control--and embedding them.

Hey, it's Free Software. I know. It's noble, pure, whatever. But after two years, it's closer in functionality to Wordpad than to a 1991-vintage word processor. It's not really fair to compare it to the now-free OpenOffice, since that had a decade as a commercial product to get where it is. But KWord is much farther along--and a younger project.

The feature matrix on Abisource's site is revealing. You'll notice that with the exception of tables, the inventory of features implemented or planned only includes what's essentially already there. There's no evidence of a serious project roadmap, or any awareness of what features a modern word processor has. I know AbiWord isn't intended to do everything the so-called "bloated" word processors do. But being able to write a paper for an introductory Biology class or send a personalized form letter to twenty people aren't exactly "frills" these days.

I can only speculate that the core AbiWord developers don't use word processors in their daily lives and never have. Maybe they wrote their college papers with LaTeX in emacs.

Well the link is here, with the download page here, just in case the URLs for the place not not obvious.

;-)

Well the link is here, with the download page here, just in case the URLs for the place not not obvious.

;-)

--

It has to work on Windows...

Apple has announced it has no plans to support a JVM later than 1.1.8 on the classic Mac OS so you can't use all those great collection classes in Java 1.2 and be cross platform! (See Apple's Java Developer page and scroll down to where it says "Mac OS Classic Java".)

Use a cross-platform application framework. That way you can program on Linux, Mac, BeOS, Windows or maybe even QNX and deliver for all those schoolkids running Windows ME on their parents' PC.

One such framework, for C++, is ZooLib. There are many others, as you can see from The GUI Toolkit, Framework Page.

Read about why it's important to write cross-platform code.

I'm most familiar with ZooLib, because I've been working with it on the products I write for my clients, and I helped ZooLib author Andy Green prepare it for open source release late last year under the MIT License.

ZooLib offers all of the following implemented as C++ classes:

• Multithreading, with cross-platform C++ thread classes and various kinds of locks (simple mutexes, reader/writer locks) - multithreading is important for something like a servent. For systems like the Mac OS that don't have preemptive threads it has a handrolled thread scheduler.
• GUI, with a uniquely flexible layout method. The widgets are rendered by platform appropriate renderers, and you can make custom widgets. There's a renderer that will call through to the Appearance Manager on the Mac OS, if it's running.
• platform-independent TCP networking, it's implemented in terms of sockets on Linux, WinSock on Windows, sockets on BeOS and MacTCP on Mac OS. I think Open Transport may be working too on the Mac, I'm not sure - but on all platforms you use the same C++ classes for your networking with no platform-specific client code needed.
• Thread-safe reference counted smart pointers, for quick, efficient memory management that's free of leaks.
• Extensive debugging support - assertions in core components and a debugging memory manager, handy macros for assertions and the like
• Single-file database format with C++ interface. Create ZDatabase objects with ZTables in them. Much zippier than SQL and more pleasing to the object-oriented soul.
• File objects - you instantiate a ZFile object from a ZFileRef object, then use its Open, Close, Read and Write methods
• Platform-specific file open and save dialogs with an API that's consistent with the rest of ZooLib. Filter by filetype on the Mac or filename three letter extension on windows. While ZooLib is cross-platform, it breaks out into platform specific code in cases like this where it's appropriate, in a way that's considered entirely sacreligious by the Java community.
• Streams that can be chained to provide filtering, somewhat like the iostreams classes in the C++ standard library but more appropriate for use with binary data. This is how you typically read or write to a file or network connection.
• Handy preprocessor macros to deal with platform specific code or selecting options like debug builds.
• Offscreen graphics buffers that may be manipulated directly via pointers or accessed in a manner that is transparent to the bit depth via GetPixel and SetPixel calls. All platforms have the same API that provide a wrapper around platform bitmap buffers. I believe there's a purely homegrown in-memory implementation, plus platform implementations bounds to the native GUI layer like GWorlds on the Mac OS.

ZooLib 0.81 is known to build with MetroWerks CodeWarrior on Windows and Mac OS, gcc on Linux, and gcc on BeOS for Pentium.

If you use CodeWarrior you can cross-compile and cross-debug; check out Thursby Software for some filesharing solutions that work well for this. (Tip - on Windows, select the "MacBinarize" post-linker in the target linker prefs when building a Mac target - you also need to derez all your resource files and include them as Rez text source).

While it should ultimately work, there are known build problems with BSD, CodeWarrior for BeOS PowerPC and Visual C++ on Windows. These are all being worked on and full support for all these platforms is expected before long.

Other cross-platform frameworks I'd like to note are:

• The Adaptive Communications Environment for cross-platform networking
• GTK - yes, that's right, GTK! but you must forgo using XLib calls and POSIX calls that are not in the ANSI C Standard Library
• The Netscape Portable Runtime for the non-GUI aspects of cross-platform development
• The Mozilla XPToolkit for cross-platform GUI
• Mozilla Netlib for network and file stream access
• Mozilla XPInstall for cross-platform installation, packaging and updating.
• Also check out AbiWord, a great cross-platform WYSIWYG word processor that's open source, with an open file format. As far as I know the only product coded in AbiWord's XP framework is AbiWord itself, but it's worth looking into for another look at how people architect these things.

People often mistake these problems for valid arguments that one should not do cross-platform development, or perhaps not render your own widgets when doing so but depend on platform specific ones (like AWT vs. Swing), but I think the lightweight, well architected, efficient and easy to use ZooLib answers those arguments very eloquently.

Help me teach the Free Software community to write quality code.

Mike

If the term 'Enlightenment' were trademarked, other Linux people wouldn't be able to use the term 'Enlightenment', although they would be able to distribute the window manager.

Trademark exists to protect consumers from confusion. If I'm distributing a genuine copy of Enlightenment, there isn't anything confusing me about calling it Enlightenment. I can certainly use the term "Microsoft Windows" to describe the system I'm using right now, and if I sell my computer, I can say "Comes with a licensed copy of Microsoft Windows" (assuming it actually does). You can use a trademark all you want to describe the product or service the trademark applies to. If I buy a new copy of Windows and don't open it, I can print up advertisements that I'm selling a copy of Microsoft Windows. As long as there is no possibility for confusion between the product or service the trademark applies to and something unrelated, everything is fine.

This situation has actually come up. SourceGear has trademarks on AbiWord and related Abi prefixed products. SourceGear makes the trademarks available under certain terms. If I want to fork AbiWord and not agree to those terms, I have to give it a new name. If I didn't change the name, there might be confusion between my AbiWord and SourceGear's AbiWord. I can describe it as "Based on AbiWord," so long as I'm careful to not imply that my product is AbiWord (that is a grey area, however).

Why is everyone so convinced that Linux has to be prettied up, promoted, and made palatable to the masses?

Because the masses have money. Companies like money. Companies that see the prospect of money in Linux on the desktop are more likely to publish Linux ports of their video games, write Linux drivers for their hardware, and offer Linux-compatible ISP services and online media.

I like Linux game, Linux drivers, and Linux compatibility. Any more questions?

There are many more reasons why even the most hardcore, non-gaming, free-software-only Linux user still benefits by "Linux for the masses", though. You may complain that Red Hat is aiming for a Linux distribution a 3 year old can use... but they're not taking away our Perl interpreters and ssh daemons to do it, and eventually that 3 year old may grow up and spend a little time playing around with the compiler himself.

The other thing that's "vital for desktop acceptance" is an office suite of the caliber of MS Office 2000, which isn't going to happen unless they decide to port it.

Of course it isn't. Free software developers could never produce any sort of useful desktop software on their own, certainly not any office programs. That stuff is just too complicated for a bunch of hackers. Why, where would they even start?

Use AbiWord. It compiles in Windows and in many UNIX flavors. It file format it's XML, and it's a light WP.

Why is everyone clamoring about Star/Open Office? It is so slow and bloated, i'd rather lay out pixels manually to create text... Don't get me wrong, it is nice to have GPL software galore, but this is not going to be the msoffice-killer. Abiword, on the other hand is a nice, lightweight wordprocessor. it does not yet have the features to take on word, but it is clear that soon enough, it will be ready. it does not drag your system to a halt or eat up all your memory. it just works. its .abw file format is XML based, and it can read .doc documents without much problem. it is not ready to use for producing a novel yet, but can do so many things, that it is fine for everyday use. it is free (GPL) and fast and wonderful. it is the only wordprocessor i use now.
I think that people who worship Star/Open Office should take a look at AbiWord (available for windows, linux, beos, qnx, BSD, AIX, irix, and solaris and can be compiled on pretty much anything as far as i know--probably required some libs though). It is amazing and fast, just what you would want from a word processor. StarOffice is way to slow for me, not to mention it is very cumbersome to use. AbiSource is the web site for AbiWord. Please go there and download the latest release, you will not regret it.
ps...a new version has just been released. although i have not had the chance to try it, i'm sure it rocks. i will let you know when i have. get it!

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# cd /

Why is everyone clamoring about Star/Open Office? It is so slow and bloated, i'd rather lay out pixels manually to create text... Don't get me wrong, it is nice to have GPL software galore, but this is not going to be the msoffice-killer. Abiword, on the other hand is a nice, lightweight wordprocessor. it does not yet have the features to take on word, but it is clear that soon enough, it will be ready. it does not drag your system to a halt or eat up all your memory. it just works. its .abw file format is XML based, and it can read .doc documents without much problem. it is not ready to use for producing a novel yet, but can do so many things, that it is fine for everyday use. it is free (GPL) and fast and wonderful. it is the only wordprocessor i use now.
I think that people who worship Star/Open Office should take a look at AbiWord (available for windows, linux, beos, qnx, BSD, AIX, irix, and solaris and can be compiled on pretty much anything as far as i know--probably required some libs though). It is amazing and fast, just what you would want from a word processor. StarOffice is way to slow for me, not to mention it is very cumbersome to use. AbiSource is the web site for AbiWord. Please go there and download the latest release, you will not regret it.
ps...a new version has just been released. although i have not had the chance to try it, i'm sure it rocks. i will let you know when i have. get it!

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# cd /

In one of your other posts, you mentioned banner ads without font smoothing/antialiasing. The GIMP does antialiasing. As for colour matching, I never had a need for it, but I never did professional publishing. When I need colour accuracy, I paint by numbers.

I see the lack of Truetype as a greater impedement to amateur desktop publishing. Truetype is excellent for people who care about what their work looks like while they're making it, but it is not as good as other font formats for the final output (Think small caps, character kerning etc.). And Linux, unlike Windows 3.1 doesn't support Truetype, it supports hacking truetype into an X-like font, or rendering truetype on the screen, but linux, unlike Windows 3.1 has no underlying printing architecture.

Read up on why Abiword uses Truetype under Windows, but not under Linux for more information:

http://www.abisource.com/faquser.phtml #2. 7

Besides, with no printing architecture (which I believe Gnome is working on correcting), you certainly couldn't do ICC on printers anyways.

http://developer.gnome.org /ar ch/imaging/printing.html -- I hope somebody's touched that since its September 1998 date.

That about exhausts my knowledge of printing, fonts and graphics. Some day I'll have to get my hands dirty on these projects.

As far as your comments regarding the Gnome Foundation go, I would encourage you to read the Draft Charter. There's a lot of good stuff in there. It's heavily modeled on the Apache Foundation. The Foundation isn't just a bunch of companies dictating policy. In fact, that's precisely what it isn't. I, for one, happen to be a member of the Gnome Foundation, and I have contributed relatively little. They're very open to letting contributors be voting members, and very opposed to the Foundation being dictated by corporate policy. I'll give you some quotations from the charter to give you an idea of what I'm talking about:

In almost every sense of the word, GNOME is an open project. This is one of our greatest strengths, has always been, and should be the balefire by which we plot our course into the future.

The foundation should not be exclusionary or elitist. Every GNOME contributor, however small his or her contribution, must have the opportunity to participate in determining the direction and actions of the project.

The openness of GNOME has always been a point of pride for us, and an important characteristic which distinguishes us from many of the other open source projects out there. Anyone can become a contributor, write access to our CVS does not involve trial by fire or other masonic rituals, we don't use Access Control Lists, and we've always been exceedingly good about folding talented newcomers in our arms and welcoming them to the project. No resume required.

Participation in the foundation is intended only for those people who are responsible for actual contributions to the software which makes up GNOME. A corporation, organization or individual should not be granted a place in the foundation unless its presence is justified by the merits of its contribution. Money cannot buy influence in the GNOME project: show us the code (or documentation, or translations, or leadership, or webmastering...).

The foundation must act in the best interests of GNOME, independent of influence from outside organizations and corporations. No single entity should have the ability to direct GNOME to its own ends.

I hope some of this helps...
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There will be no sync issues with Ogg Vorbis. The quality of an N-Sync song is so low that not even Ogg Vorbis can make it sound better. Therefore, n-sync is not supported.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

Now apply the same thinking to software, if your profit margin is in the first sale, then any activity which results in suppression of repeat sales of the next upgrade is to be severely discouraged. Entities like Microsoft have tacitly acknowledged this by noting that their biggest competitor is actually their old products.

Thus if your business model relies on forcing customers to go through an endless upgrade cycle (cough*Wintel*cough) the Internet is a threat because so long as there is one person with the passion and resources to keep a copy, others will be able to find it and offer some exchange/trade/resale. Think of web-rings, freshmeat and mirrors, all which collectively serve to persist information and minimise bit rot. This may not suit companies accustomised to high information decay rates as it forces them into a service model which is human intensive and because they've bid up the price of programming labor to insane levels in hiring software engineers to churn out the next killer-app, can't compete as service model requires a somewhat different skillset (more diagnostic and less development). Lower margins = less profits = collapsing share prices = pissed off investors.

As AbiWord CEO points out, "Users are tired of the crazy upgrade cycle which has become the norm for so many desktop applications", primarily because it puts the real cost of software in wasted time learning applications which may be deprecated in the next release cycle. From the software developers and distributors point of view, old software is also a disincentive for upgrading and thus their desire to shorten the half life of information or put time-limited licensing terms into their EULA.

OpenSource sorta gets around the problem as their real business is stability and interoperability, despite all too frequent plaintive cries that Unix is not "innovative" or "bleeding-edge". Until the marketing/advocacy people realise this and emphasise low "cost of repair/replacement", they will be perceived as at a disadvantage to "mainstream" software. However, despite similar functionality, it is a distinct business from licensing IP blocks (drag,drop,script) where all the value is retained by the manufacturer. Just like abandonware is not really a software distribution, it is in the nostalgia business. As such, it can probably carve out a small niche for its proponent provided he's smart to avoid copyright lawsuits, given that the majority of software purchasers have short-term memory (when did you ever come across a piece of non-gaming software that you really *enjoyed* using?). LL

Well, if you don't use AIM, you'll miss out on all those stimulating conversations with 15 year olds asking you for your a/s/l.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

The development version of AbiWord currently has the capability to export PalmDoc format .pdb files.

www.abisource.com

If you do not want to download from the CVS, you can get the latest release (0.7.11) later this week (so I'm told ;-)

There is actually a fix for this, although it seems like a kludge. Open up an email and it will open up in a small window. Now use your mouse to drag the corners until the window takes up the entire screen. You can now close that window and every window you open in Outlook Express should open up maximized from now on.<br>
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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

oops, your right. I should have looked first. The two choices in Outlook Express are "Internet Zone" and "Restricted Zone". "Restricted Zone" is the one to use.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

There is a setting in outlook which tells it to use the "Internet Zone" security setting. This should be the default but I don't think it is. This is what I have my Outlook security set to. You also have to adjust the "Internet Zone" settings to not allow scripting of any kind. I suspect that if everyone had the correct security settings, the Melissa and ILoveYou viruses would never have caused any damage whatsoever. I'm not saying that outlook is perfect (Scripting in email is a dangerous thing and should be turned off by default) but I think it gets a bad rap because its from Microsoft. Remember, basic security principles must be followed no matter what program or OS you're using.

PS: One advantage of Outlook, is that it integrates fairly easily with PGP. Eudora also does this. One note about Pegasus, we have it at work and its the ugliest most user unfriendly email program I've ever used. And this is coming from a person whose first email program was Pegasus.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

If your interested in GPS, you may also be interested in GRASS Geographic Information System (GIS) Software. It won't help you interface your Garmin with your PC but it will let you put all that data you collect with your GPS to good use.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

Does this include the sys-admins whose machines were used for K5 DDOS attacks?

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

The tank was on the outside of the frame. The point behind the controversy was that it is safer to place it inside of the frame. NBC's problem was that they felt it was better to make the news rather than to just report it. I agree about the Simpsons though.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

I've just started using PGP and I'm still trying to learn all the in's and out's of it. Its definately harder to learn to use than your average email program. I think that's why most people don't use it anymore than they do.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

As for the link you're talking about, I did mive it to the bottom of the story and added explanation.

Moving that link to bottom wasn't good enough. It should have been removed completely. In fact, it never should have been linked to in the first place.

It's a cruel, uncaring net. Click carefully out there.

Come on Jamie, this is a cop out. We expect more from the people running slashdot. We expect you to know more about the net and we expect you to "get it". Linking directly to that download and then telling people that they should have clicked more carefully is like leaving a loaded 44 Magnum in the gun circle and not expecting anyone to use it. It farcical.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

Read the article moron. Its only 3 chapters. I doubt that three dollars is going to break anyone.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

I've never read a Stephen King book but I paid the dollar for part 1 and downloaded it primarily because I believed in the idea. Please take that link down quickly.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

Actually, we all want Ferarris, but most of us are forced to drive Toyotas :)

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

For the Neon which gets 35 mpb, you'll pay about $10,000. ((233,333/35)*1.5)

Correct? If so, then that's only a $5000 difference. In that case, you'd need twice as many miles, 466,666, to break even. Most cars are going to have trouble making it that far. If we can expect the car to last 100,000 miles, then we would not want to pay more than $2,142.86 more for the 70 mpg car over the 35 mpg car at $1.50 per gallon.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

As a user, this kind of thinking bothers me. Its really difficult to gauge the intellectual capacity and self-motivation of a person. Sure, some people can't make use of additional software, either because their not smart enough or because they just don't have the desire to. But a bright, self-motivated employee will expand to his potential if his environment gives him enough room. Sure, a person may have been hired to do one job in one particular way, but that person may be capable of doing far greater things. If you cripple that person by restricting his resources, then he may never live up to his potential. That hurts both him and his employer. I say that unless giving everyone a particular tool (software or otherwise) is an undue burden, then go ahead and let them have it and maybe they'll do something usefull with it. If you then find that the costs of providing that particular tool outweigh the benefits, then you can be more selective regarding that tool. In the long run, I think thats the better approach.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

Terms and Conditions

Copyright (c) 2000 Phil Thompson (phil@river-bank.demon.co.uk)

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

Except as contained in this notice, the name of the copyright holder shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written authorization from the copyright holder.

If you are actually using machines designed as workstations (thin clients), I agree. But if you are using PCs, then isn't this a huge waste of the processor power, hard drive capacity, etc.. of a desktop. I'm a user not an administrator, so of course my main concern is that is that I have the apps I need to get my work done. This means that I don't want to wait on a slow network while I'm using an app. I also don't want to sit and stare at a useless pile of parts if the network is down (this has happended quite a bit where I work).

I realize that having apps installed on 2500 hardrives might be a nightmare, but you shouldn't lose sight of why you have those apps in the first place. Those apps are there to support the needs of the end user, not to make the admin's job easier. After all, that's why you get paid the big bucks right? :)

Is there a way to remotely manage apps on the hard drives, if not maybe there should be. How about remote power on. I mean as long as those PCs are turned on, you should have remote access to their hard drives and you shouldn't have to go around and turn on every one manually. Actually, I think this would be a great idea anyway. I'd love for my computer to be on and ready to go when I walk in at 8:10, er I mean 8:00. But then again, if your network never goes down, and those apps will run from the server as fast as they would run from a desktop, then sure, I agree, buy thin clients and put everything on the server. But if you work were I do, that's the last thing you want.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

These are the people who will use these new features. They're the ones who design web pages that suck and that doesn't look like its going to change any time soon. This is going to be a problem for a very long time.

P.S.: I'm a user of IE 5.0, this story just convinced me to switch to Netscape when it finally comes out. Whenever the hell that will be.

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AbiWord: The BEST opensource word processor

Abi Word does not provide all the features you may expect from a word processor, but is quite useful IMHO. Gnumeric is a fairly advanced replacement for Excel and it keeps improving at an amazing pace. Give'em a try.

Check it out for word processing and it'll be all you need.

Mike Roberto (roberto@soul.apk.net) -GAIM: MicroBerto

• http://www.wvWare.com/, maybe the best open source Word converter? Formerly "mswordview", it's a library and a front-end app, which is currently AbiWord's converter.
• word2x
• AbiSource, a company producing an open source, cross platform, comercial office suite. Their motto was "SHOW ME THE SOURCE!!!", which we had to scream at the March 1999 Linuxworld Expo in order to get their t-shirt.
• Adobe FrameMaker for Linux -- Not sure if it does Office, but it's a commercial word processor!
• VistaSource / ApplixWare -- Cross platform, partially open source, complete office suite and integrated development environment in the form of either a local app, or as a Java-based thin client plus app server architecture. Compare to StarOffice. My experience has been that you can send an un-convertable Office document to Applix's closely-monitored community support mailing list, and they will attempt to modify Applixware's import filters around it, and send you a patch. How cool is that?
• S un StarOffice. Very good as well. Complete office suite. StarOffice and Applixware are capable of replacing Microsoft Office for literally most people.
• Corel Wordperfect -- See also Corel's Linux distribution.
• KDE's KOffice -- Open source office suite.
• Freshmeat.net's index of office apps

• StarOffice for Dummies http://www.us.buy.com/books/pr oduct.asp?sku=30490259 $14.99 (Save $1.00 over amazon.com) Replaces: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764505769/ ref%3Dsim%5Fbooks/103-4415661-32230 16

• Special Edition Using StarOffice, replaces htt p://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0789719932/ref =sim_books/002-2291160-6260020.

• Applixware 5 Bible for Linux w/cd-rom http://www.us.buy.com/books/pr oduct.asp?sku=30546347 $29.99 ($2 less than amazon.com) Replaces: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0764534033/ qid%3D959095708/sr%3D1-3/002 -2291160-626002

• http://www.us.buy.com/books/pr oduct.asp?sku=30400392 $14.99 ($1 less than amazon.com) Replaces: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0672314126/ ref=sim_books/002-2291160-6260020

• Mastering Koffice for Linux w/ cd-rom http://shop.barnesandnoble.com/b ooksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?userid=4LAQC2IL93&mscssi d=DLK6S46966S92MG1001PQUW78818A314&srefe r=&isbn=0782126529, replaces http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0782126529/ qid%3D959095770/002-0803865-4820213

Its GPLed, granted it needs work. So scoot onto the abiword mailing list and cvs down the latest version, get hacking on it and sort it out.

ole2 is fully sorted out with libole2, excel is being handling by gnumeric.

What is not handled by wv is not by lack of documentation or design, its simply a matter of spending some time at it. Easy peasy. Info on the MSDN docs can be got from here. They can be gotten off the MSDN 1998 July cd, or you can get some of them from wotsit.org. I even wrote ivt2html for you to convert the office.ivt file into html. Like what else do you need.

90% of all the hard work has been done, wv can parse fast and simple with no bother to it, which was a nightmare to do, it can construct the correct PAP (paragraph properties) and CHP (character properties) for a given run of text. Feed you the correct characters and charset and font, the TAP (table properties), graphic properties and handle to graphics. The correct OLE handle for embedded objects. Document properties etc. There is an example html conversion program included for reference (wvHtml).

I put together libwmf to convert wmf file into something useful as well. Theres a half done implementation of an Escher (the graphics for Office) importer floating around in there as well.

Theres also an implementation of a Summary Stream displayer for all ole2 documents.

I even bust my ass and dragged together the right bunch of motivated people to help implement the decryption module for word 97, 95 and 6, and that was not fun at all to say the least

The hard work is done, if you want something improved you have a very very solid base to work from. Yes the spec is confusing, yes its not a great format, yeah is sort of moves over time, but in a fairly rational way that can be supported with some work. There are any number of equally crap formats with weak documentation supported in various tools.

There is just this false myth that the Microsoft formats are inpenetrable and/or not available. Just download wv, fair enough there might be problem documents, if there are, just debug wv and get onto the abiword list and work it out with them. If something fails it can be fixed and improved, its not a case of "ah well, its a MS format, nothing can be done". If you truly want to handle Microsoft formats there are a number of people working on it that you can help.

So its right there for the right bunch of motivated people to work on. C.

AbiWord is taking enormous strides and has the best looking and easiest word processor around, and they cover SEVERAL operating systems. It's also about 2 megs, rarely crashes, and is having more and more features added, although its not totally loaded yet.

AbiWord is a great program and I recommend it for word processing in linux.

Mike Roberto (roberto@soul.apk.net) -GAIM: MicroBerto

Whoops. I clicked on Submit by accident, but thought I caught it in time. Guess not. Read this message instead... :-\

I cannot argue with the lack of functional, friendly editors for
either *ML or its stylesheets. Have we identified a need? Is there a
place for a WYSIWYG word processor which manages the tension between
local formatting and reuse for the user, which integrates and
abstracts away the management of DTD/schemas and stylesheets? Maybe,
maybe not. Does our friend want to post his chemistry paper to the
web, archive it? Does giving LyX an *ML fluent backend accomplish this
goal?

Well, some applications do keep their documents in an SGML or XML
format: AbiWord saves files
with an abw extension that are (according to file)
``exported SGML document text''. AbiSource's FAQ
states that their native file format is XML (and gives some reasons
and a link to their
DTD). A brief example document might look like the following:

<!-- ================================================== =================== -->

<!-- This file is an AbiWord document. -->

<!-- AbiWord is a free, Open Source word processor. -->

<!-- You may obtain more information about AbiWord at www.abisource.com -->

<!-- You should not edit this file by hand. -->

<!-- ================================================== =================== -->

<!-- Build_ID = (none) -->

<!-- Build_Version = 0.7.7 -->

<!-- Build_Options = LicensedTrademarks:Off Debug:Off -->

<!-- Build_Target = /project/debian/abiword-0.7.7/abi-0.7.7/src/Linux_ 2.3.6_ppc_OBJ/obj -->

<!-- Build_CompileTime = 12:48:12 -->

<!-- Build_CompileDate = Dec 16 1999 -->

<abiword version="0.7.7">

<section>

<p style="Heading 1">This is a major heading, level one</p>

<p></p>

<p>So, here we have a basic AbiWord document.</p>

<p></p>

<p>"Say, Joe, whaddya know?" Hmm, no smart quotes.</p>

<p></p>

<p style="Heading 2">This is a second-level header</p>

<p></p>

<p>Some more plain text that isn't particularly important.</p>

<p></p>

<p style="Heading 3">Here we have a third-level header</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">And we're back to normal.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">Out of curiosity, we have <c props="font-weight:bold">some bold text,</c> and <c props="font-style:italic">some italic text.</c></p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Plain Text">This text is in the plain text style, which is kind of like \texttt. Bizarre.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Block Text">And this text is in the block text style, which I'm guessing is like quotation or quote or <blockquote>.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">Looks like I was right.</p>

</section>

</abiword>

AbiWord's interface is very Word-like, including rulers for margin
adjustment and toolbars with buttons to open, save, and close files;
appear in multiple columns; make text italic, bold, underlined, and so
forth; and set justification. As such, it's very useful for people
moving from other computing platforms who are looking for replacements
for their commercial word-processing applications, but that also means
that it's not ideal as a structured SGML/XML editor (without a
significant amount of additional work, at any rate).

Other applications, such as Dia, a diagramming
application, save their output in recognizable XML (file says
``XML 1.0 document text'', and the document looks like XML when you
view it in a text editor).

Finally, as I mentioned previously, Conglomerate is specifically
designed to be an XML editor, but isn't really available yet.
Conglomerate looks like an SGML editor -- it clearly shows the tagging
of various bits of text.

In any case, I'm not sure I'm convinced that a WYSIWYG editor is
the best approach -- I think some sort of simplified syntax (such as
that provided by LaTeX) that could easily be translated to SGML or XML
might be a better solution. I like the ideas shown in the screenshots of
Conglomerate because they make the structural and other markup
very clear without the illusion of control that would be provided by
an interface such as AbiWord's. What I think is needed is an
interface that would make the structure and other tags clear, and
allow tags to be inserted by typing them directly (presumably with
some macro features) or selecting from a mutable menu or palette (that
would only present viable options for the selected text or cursor
location). Although I hate to say it (because I hate them), I don't
know that ``wizards'' would be entirely out of place for help with
some complicated constructs.

I do think that you're right to believe that such tools will evolve
themselves into existence, and that, as they do, more and more people
may find themselves using SGML or XML without even realizing that they
are. Time will tell.

I find it absolutely incredibly that a publisher is shooting
plates from 600dpi laser output, although I can probably guess the
publisher.

That makes two of us. I was surprised that they didn't want the
LaTeX source, shocked when I found out they didn't want the
PostScript, and horrified when I found out what they actually
used.

Whoops. I clicked on Submit by accident, but thought I caught it in time. Guess not. Read this message instead... :-\

I cannot argue with the lack of functional, friendly editors for
either *ML or its stylesheets. Have we identified a need? Is there a
place for a WYSIWYG word processor which manages the tension between
local formatting and reuse for the user, which integrates and
abstracts away the management of DTD/schemas and stylesheets? Maybe,
maybe not. Does our friend want to post his chemistry paper to the
web, archive it? Does giving LyX an *ML fluent backend accomplish this
goal?

Well, some applications do keep their documents in an SGML or XML
format: AbiWord saves files
with an abw extension that are (according to file)
``exported SGML document text''. AbiSource's FAQ
states that their native file format is XML (and gives some reasons
and a link to their
DTD). A brief example document might look like the following:

<!-- ================================================== =================== -->

<!-- This file is an AbiWord document. -->

<!-- AbiWord is a free, Open Source word processor. -->

<!-- You may obtain more information about AbiWord at www.abisource.com -->

<!-- You should not edit this file by hand. -->

<!-- ================================================== =================== -->

<!-- Build_ID = (none) -->

<!-- Build_Version = 0.7.7 -->

<!-- Build_Options = LicensedTrademarks:Off Debug:Off -->

<!-- Build_Target = /project/debian/abiword-0.7.7/abi-0.7.7/src/Linux_ 2.3.6_ppc_OBJ/obj -->

<!-- Build_CompileTime = 12:48:12 -->

<!-- Build_CompileDate = Dec 16 1999 -->

<abiword version="0.7.7">

<section>

<p style="Heading 1">This is a major heading, level one</p>

<p></p>

<p>So, here we have a basic AbiWord document.</p>

<p></p>

<p>"Say, Joe, whaddya know?" Hmm, no smart quotes.</p>

<p></p>

<p style="Heading 2">This is a second-level header</p>

<p></p>

<p>Some more plain text that isn't particularly important.</p>

<p></p>

<p style="Heading 3">Here we have a third-level header</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">And we're back to normal.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">Out of curiosity, we have <c props="font-weight:bold">some bold text,</c> and <c props="font-style:italic">some italic text.</c></p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Plain Text">This text is in the plain text style, which is kind of like \texttt. Bizarre.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Block Text">And this text is in the block text style, which I'm guessing is like quotation or quote or <blockquote>.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">Looks like I was right.</p>

</section>

</abiword>

AbiWord's interface is very Word-like, including rulers for margin
adjustment and toolbars with buttons to open, save, and close files;
appear in multiple columns; make text italic, bold, underlined, and so
forth; and set justification. As such, it's very useful for people
moving from other computing platforms who are looking for replacements
for their commercial word-processing applications, but that also means
that it's not ideal as a structured SGML/XML editor (without a
significant amount of additional work, at any rate).

Other applications, such as Dia, a diagramming
application, save their output in recognizable XML (file says
``XML 1.0 document text'', and the document looks like XML when you
view it in a text editor).

Finally, as I mentioned previously, Conglomerate is specifically
designed to be an XML editor, but isn't really available yet.
Conglomerate looks like an SGML editor -- it clearly shows the tagging
of various bits of text.

In any case, I'm not sure I'm convinced that a WYSIWYG editor is
the best approach -- I think some sort of simplified syntax (such as
that provided by LaTeX) that could easily be translated to SGML or XML
might be a better solution. I like the ideas shown in the screenshots of
Conglomerate because they make the structural and other markup
very clear without the illusion of control that would be provided by
an interface such as AbiWord's. What I think is needed is an
interface that would make the structure and other tags clear, and
allow tags to be inserted by typing them directly (presumably with
some macro features) or selecting from a mutable menu or palette (that
would only present viable options for the selected text or cursor
location). Although I hate to say it (because I hate them), I don't
know that ``wizards'' would be entirely out of place for help with
some complicated constructs.

I do think that you're right to believe that such tools will evolve
themselves into existence, and that, as they do, more and more people
may find themselves using SGML or XML without even realizing that they
are. Time will tell.

I find it absolutely incredibly that a publisher is shooting
plates from 600dpi laser output, although I can probably guess the
publisher.

That makes two of us. I was surprised that they didn't want the
LaTeX source, shocked when I found out they didn't want the
PostScript, and horrified when I found out what they actually
used.

Whoops. I clicked on Submit by accident, but thought I caught it in time. Guess not. Read this message instead... :-\

I cannot argue with the lack of functional, friendly editors for
either *ML or its stylesheets. Have we identified a need? Is there a
place for a WYSIWYG word processor which manages the tension between
local formatting and reuse for the user, which integrates and
abstracts away the management of DTD/schemas and stylesheets? Maybe,
maybe not. Does our friend want to post his chemistry paper to the
web, archive it? Does giving LyX an *ML fluent backend accomplish this
goal?

Well, some applications do keep their documents in an SGML or XML
format: AbiWord saves files
with an abw extension that are (according to file)
``exported SGML document text''. AbiSource's FAQ
states that their native file format is XML (and gives some reasons
and a link to their
DTD). A brief example document might look like the following:

<!-- ================================================== =================== -->

<!-- This file is an AbiWord document. -->

<!-- AbiWord is a free, Open Source word processor. -->

<!-- You may obtain more information about AbiWord at www.abisource.com -->

<!-- You should not edit this file by hand. -->

<!-- ================================================== =================== -->

<!-- Build_ID = (none) -->

<!-- Build_Version = 0.7.7 -->

<!-- Build_Options = LicensedTrademarks:Off Debug:Off -->

<!-- Build_Target = /project/debian/abiword-0.7.7/abi-0.7.7/src/Linux_ 2.3.6_ppc_OBJ/obj -->

<!-- Build_CompileTime = 12:48:12 -->

<!-- Build_CompileDate = Dec 16 1999 -->

<abiword version="0.7.7">

<section>

<p style="Heading 1">This is a major heading, level one</p>

<p></p>

<p>So, here we have a basic AbiWord document.</p>

<p></p>

<p>"Say, Joe, whaddya know?" Hmm, no smart quotes.</p>

<p></p>

<p style="Heading 2">This is a second-level header</p>

<p></p>

<p>Some more plain text that isn't particularly important.</p>

<p></p>

<p style="Heading 3">Here we have a third-level header</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">And we're back to normal.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">Out of curiosity, we have <c props="font-weight:bold">some bold text,</c> and <c props="font-style:italic">some italic text.</c></p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Plain Text">This text is in the plain text style, which is kind of like \texttt. Bizarre.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Block Text">And this text is in the block text style, which I'm guessing is like quotation or quote or <blockquote>.</p>

<p style="Normal"></p>

<p style="Normal">Looks like I was right.</p>

</section>

</abiword>

AbiWord's interface is very Word-like, including rulers for margin
adjustment and toolbars with buttons to open, save, and close files;
appear in multiple columns; make text italic, bold, underlined, and so
forth; and set justification. As such, it's very useful for people
moving from other computing platforms who are looking for replacements
for their commercial word-processing applications, but that also means
that it's not ideal as a structured SGML/XML editor (without a
significant amount of additional work, at any rate).

Other applications, such as Dia, a diagramming
application, save their output in recognizable XML (file says
``XML 1.0 document text'', and the document looks like XML when you
view it in a text editor).

Finally, as I mentioned previously, Conglomerate is specifically
designed to be an XML editor, but isn't really available yet.
Conglomerate looks like an SGML editor -- it clearly shows the tagging
of various bits of text.

In any case, I'm not sure I'm convinced that a WYSIWYG editor is
the best approach -- I think some sort of simplified syntax (such as
that provided by LaTeX) that could easily be translated to SGML or XML
might be a better solution. I like the ideas shown in the screenshots of
Conglomerate because they make the structural and other markup
very clear without the illusion of control that would be provided by
an interface such as AbiWord's. What I think is needed is an
interface that would make the structure and other tags clear, and
allow tags to be inserted by typing them directly (presumably with
some macro features) or selecting from a mutable menu or palette (that
would only present viable options for the selected text or cursor
location). Although I hate to say it (because I hate them), I don't
know that ``wizards'' would be entirely out of place for help with
some complicated constructs.

I do think that you're right to believe that such tools will evolve
themselves into existence, and that, as they do, more and more people
may find themselves using SGML or XML without even realizing that they
are. Time will tell.

I find it absolutely incredibly that a publisher is shooting
plates from 600dpi laser output, although I can probably guess the
publisher.

That makes two of us. I was surprised that they didn't want the
LaTeX source, shocked when I found out they didn't want the
PostScript, and horrified when I found out what they actually
used.

I cannot argue with the lack of functional, friendly editors for either *ML or its stylesheets. Have we identified a need? Is there a place for a WYSIWYG word processor which manages the tension between local formatting and reuse for the user, which integrates and abstracts away the management of DTD/schemas and stylesheets? Maybe, maybe not. Does our friend want to post his chemistry paper to the web, archive it? Does giving LyX an *ML fluent backend accomplish this goal?

Well, some applications do keep their documents in an SGML or XML format: AbiWord saves files with an abw extension that are (according to file) ``exported SGML document text''. AbiSource's FAQ states that their native file format is XML (and gives some reasons and a link to their DTD). A brief example document might look like the following:

<!-- ================================================== =================== --> <!-- This file is an AbiWord document. --> <!-- AbiWord is a free, Open Source word processor. --> <!-- You may obtain more information about AbiWord at www.abisource.com --> <!-- You should not edit this file by hand. --> <!-- ================================================== =================== --> <!-- Build_ID = (none) --> <!-- Build_Version = 0.7.7 --> <!-- Build_Options = LicensedTrademarks:Off Debug:Off --> <!-- Build_Target = /project/debian/abiword-0.7.7/abi-0.7.7/src/Linux_ 2.3.6_ppc_OBJ/obj --> <!-- Build_CompileTime = 12:48:12 --> <!-- Build_CompileDate = Dec 16 1999 --> <abiword version="0.7.7"> <section> <p style="Heading 1">This is a major heading, level one</p> <p></p> <p>So, here we have a basic AbiWord document. Jeez, its spell checker doesn't even know about the spelling of the application's name? That's kind of lame.</p> <p></p> <p>"Say, Joe, whaddya know?"</p> <p></p> <p style="Heading 2">This is a second-level header</p> <p></p> <p>Some more plain text that isn't particularly important.</p> <p></p> <p style="Heading 3">Here we have a third-level header</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">And we're back to normal.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">Out of curiosity, we have <c props="font-weight:bold">some bold text,</c> and <c props="font-style:italic">some italic text.</c></p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Plain Text">This text is in the plain text style, which is kind of like \texttt. Bizarre.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Block Text">And this text is in the block text style, which I'm guessing is like quotation or quote or <blockquote>.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">Looks like I was right.</p> </section> </abiword>

AbiWord's interface is very Word-like, including rulers for margin adjustment and toolbars with buttons to open, save, and close files; appear in multiple columns; make text italic, bold, underlined, and so forth; and set justification. As such, it's very useful for people moving from other computing platforms who are looking for replacements for their commercial word-processing applications, but that means that it's not ideal as a structured SGML/XML editor (without a significant amount of additional work, at any rate).

Other applications, such as Dia, a diagramming application, save their output in recognizable XML (file says ``XML 1.0 document text'', and the document looks like XML when you view it in a text editor).

Finally, as I mentioned previously, Conglomerate is specifically designed to be an XML editor, but isn't really available yet. Conglomerate looks like an SGML editor -- it clearly shows the tagging of various bits of text.

I find it absolutely incredibly that a publisher is shooting plates from 600dpi laser output, although I can probably guess the publisher.

That makes two of us. I was surprised that they didn't want the LaTeX source, and shocked when I found out they didn't want the PostScript, and horrified when I found out what they actually used.

I cannot argue with the lack of functional, friendly editors for either *ML or its stylesheets. Have we identified a need? Is there a place for a WYSIWYG word processor which manages the tension between local formatting and reuse for the user, which integrates and abstracts away the management of DTD/schemas and stylesheets? Maybe, maybe not. Does our friend want to post his chemistry paper to the web, archive it? Does giving LyX an *ML fluent backend accomplish this goal?

Well, some applications do keep their documents in an SGML or XML format: AbiWord saves files with an abw extension that are (according to file) ``exported SGML document text''. AbiSource's FAQ states that their native file format is XML (and gives some reasons and a link to their DTD). A brief example document might look like the following:

<!-- ================================================== =================== --> <!-- This file is an AbiWord document. --> <!-- AbiWord is a free, Open Source word processor. --> <!-- You may obtain more information about AbiWord at www.abisource.com --> <!-- You should not edit this file by hand. --> <!-- ================================================== =================== --> <!-- Build_ID = (none) --> <!-- Build_Version = 0.7.7 --> <!-- Build_Options = LicensedTrademarks:Off Debug:Off --> <!-- Build_Target = /project/debian/abiword-0.7.7/abi-0.7.7/src/Linux_ 2.3.6_ppc_OBJ/obj --> <!-- Build_CompileTime = 12:48:12 --> <!-- Build_CompileDate = Dec 16 1999 --> <abiword version="0.7.7"> <section> <p style="Heading 1">This is a major heading, level one</p> <p></p> <p>So, here we have a basic AbiWord document. Jeez, its spell checker doesn't even know about the spelling of the application's name? That's kind of lame.</p> <p></p> <p>"Say, Joe, whaddya know?"</p> <p></p> <p style="Heading 2">This is a second-level header</p> <p></p> <p>Some more plain text that isn't particularly important.</p> <p></p> <p style="Heading 3">Here we have a third-level header</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">And we're back to normal.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">Out of curiosity, we have <c props="font-weight:bold">some bold text,</c> and <c props="font-style:italic">some italic text.</c></p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Plain Text">This text is in the plain text style, which is kind of like \texttt. Bizarre.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Block Text">And this text is in the block text style, which I'm guessing is like quotation or quote or <blockquote>.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">Looks like I was right.</p> </section> </abiword>

AbiWord's interface is very Word-like, including rulers for margin adjustment and toolbars with buttons to open, save, and close files; appear in multiple columns; make text italic, bold, underlined, and so forth; and set justification. As such, it's very useful for people moving from other computing platforms who are looking for replacements for their commercial word-processing applications, but that means that it's not ideal as a structured SGML/XML editor (without a significant amount of additional work, at any rate).

Other applications, such as Dia, a diagramming application, save their output in recognizable XML (file says ``XML 1.0 document text'', and the document looks like XML when you view it in a text editor).

Finally, as I mentioned previously, Conglomerate is specifically designed to be an XML editor, but isn't really available yet. Conglomerate looks like an SGML editor -- it clearly shows the tagging of various bits of text.

I find it absolutely incredibly that a publisher is shooting plates from 600dpi laser output, although I can probably guess the publisher.

That makes two of us. I was surprised that they didn't want the LaTeX source, and shocked when I found out they didn't want the PostScript, and horrified when I found out what they actually used.

I cannot argue with the lack of functional, friendly editors for either *ML or its stylesheets. Have we identified a need? Is there a place for a WYSIWYG word processor which manages the tension between local formatting and reuse for the user, which integrates and abstracts away the management of DTD/schemas and stylesheets? Maybe, maybe not. Does our friend want to post his chemistry paper to the web, archive it? Does giving LyX an *ML fluent backend accomplish this goal?

Well, some applications do keep their documents in an SGML or XML format: AbiWord saves files with an abw extension that are (according to file) ``exported SGML document text''. AbiSource's FAQ states that their native file format is XML (and gives some reasons and a link to their DTD). A brief example document might look like the following:

<!-- ================================================== =================== --> <!-- This file is an AbiWord document. --> <!-- AbiWord is a free, Open Source word processor. --> <!-- You may obtain more information about AbiWord at www.abisource.com --> <!-- You should not edit this file by hand. --> <!-- ================================================== =================== --> <!-- Build_ID = (none) --> <!-- Build_Version = 0.7.7 --> <!-- Build_Options = LicensedTrademarks:Off Debug:Off --> <!-- Build_Target = /project/debian/abiword-0.7.7/abi-0.7.7/src/Linux_ 2.3.6_ppc_OBJ/obj --> <!-- Build_CompileTime = 12:48:12 --> <!-- Build_CompileDate = Dec 16 1999 --> <abiword version="0.7.7"> <section> <p style="Heading 1">This is a major heading, level one</p> <p></p> <p>So, here we have a basic AbiWord document. Jeez, its spell checker doesn't even know about the spelling of the application's name? That's kind of lame.</p> <p></p> <p>"Say, Joe, whaddya know?"</p> <p></p> <p style="Heading 2">This is a second-level header</p> <p></p> <p>Some more plain text that isn't particularly important.</p> <p></p> <p style="Heading 3">Here we have a third-level header</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">And we're back to normal.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">Out of curiosity, we have <c props="font-weight:bold">some bold text,</c> and <c props="font-style:italic">some italic text.</c></p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Plain Text">This text is in the plain text style, which is kind of like \texttt. Bizarre.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Block Text">And this text is in the block text style, which I'm guessing is like quotation or quote or <blockquote>.</p> <p style="Normal"></p> <p style="Normal">Looks like I was right.</p> </section> </abiword>

AbiWord's interface is very Word-like, including rulers for margin adjustment and toolbars with buttons to open, save, and close files; appear in multiple columns; make text italic, bold, underlined, and so forth; and set justification. As such, it's very useful for people moving from other computing platforms who are looking for replacements for their commercial word-processing applications, but that means that it's not ideal as a structured SGML/XML editor (without a significant amount of additional work, at any rate).

Other applications, such as Dia, a diagramming application, save their output in recognizable XML (file says ``XML 1.0 document text'', and the document looks like XML when you view it in a text editor).

Finally, as I mentioned previously, Conglomerate is specifically designed to be an XML editor, but isn't really available yet. Conglomerate looks like an SGML editor -- it clearly shows the tagging of various bits of text.

I find it absolutely incredibly that a publisher is shooting plates from 600dpi laser output, although I can probably guess the publisher.

That makes two of us. I was surprised that they didn't want the LaTeX source, and shocked when I found out they didn't want the PostScript, and horrified when I found out what they actually used.