PageEdit alternative?

[exaltedwombat]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm certainly not confused. In my mind, the 'styles' you're referring to should just as much a part of today's writer's toolkit as a comma, or a period, or a spell-checker are.

Well, I didn't mean you!

I hardly see such things as 'style' anyway. Just basic word-processing literacy. But many authors don't seem to know their tools even that well.

We should complain! When authors catch on how easy it is to turn a well-constructed document into an eBook we're all out of a job.

[najgori]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I find the notion that writers need to distance themselves from designing to be old-fashioned and time-wasting.

well, that's just, like, your opinion, man...

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by najgori

well, that's just, like, your opinion, man...

Yes. Forgive me. I thought that's what we were doing here. Voicing opinions.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I'm certainly not confused. In my mind, the 'styles' you're referring to should just as much a part of today's writer's toolkit as a comma, or a period, or a spell-checker are.

Originally Posted by najgori

well, that's just, like, your opinion, man...

Are you saying that, in your opinion, DiapDealer is not entitled to state his opinions in this and other forums?

BTW, an opinion which I agree with. I have spend some time on going over how to create a document that will be easier to convert with several authors. Oddly, some of them are more than willing to listen and learn. There is another group that (IMNSHO) seem to believe that the art of writing reached it's pinnacle with the invention of the the quill pen.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Then use a typewriter or write on paper and stop using tools made for writing AND designing.

I find the notion that writers need to distance themselves from designing to be old-fashioned and time-wasting.

If that's the way it's "supposed to be" then writers should also get absolutely no say in the final design. You either care how it ultimately looks, or you don't. And if you DO care, then take a proactive role in making it happen the way you want.

AMEN, brother, preach it!

I was appalled at that post that Notjohn linked us to. I mean, talk about arrogant, condescending, patronizing TRIPE. I wanted to find that guy and slap him silly. "Oh, learning how to use a word processor is okay for SECRETARIES and CLERICAL claptrap, but WE, we proud few, of the AUTHOR class, well, we needn't bother our pretty little, incredibly-valuable heads with such petty details."

What a load of old s**t.

Hitch

[BetterRed]

@Hitch - in what ribbon do I find the Document Pane. You've mentioned it twice. I know the Navigation, Editor, Review, and Selection Panes - but not the Document Pane. What does it do - perhaps I know it as something else - e.g. Outline View.

After installing Word 2007 (first version with the Ribbon) I learnt more about Word in a year, than I had in decades of using previous versions. So, I'm a Ribbon devotee (hidden of course). Many non-MS Ribbons are pathetic, whilst others are downright diabolical.

BR

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

@Hitch - in what ribbon do I find the Document Pane. You've mentioned it twice. I know the Navigation, Editor, Review, and Selection Panes - but not the Document Pane. What does it do - perhaps I know it as something else - e.g. Outline View.

After installing Word 2007 (first version with the Ribbon) I learnt more about Word in a year, than I had in decades of using previous versions. So, I'm a Ribbon devotee (hidden of course). Many non-MS Ribbons are pathetic, whilst others are downright diabolical.

BR

Sorry, I mean the Navigation pane, which as you've mentioned, you know. Years ago, it was called the Document Map, and I tend to think of it that way still. :-)

People who don't understand styles and headings, outline view and the Nav pane understand NOTHING about Word. And, as such, criticize something that they neither understand nor have any expertise. Like that absurdly self-absorbed, self-aggrandizing twaddle from Rob Sawyer.

Hitch

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Sorry, I mean the Navigation pane, which as you've mentioned, you know. Years ago, it was called the Document Map, and I tend to think of it that way still. :-)

Ah yes, remember that - not sure I knew what it was though, pre 2007 I baulked at selecting options I didn't fully understand, lest they lead me astray.

Originally Posted by Hitch

People who don't understand styles and headings, outline view and the Nav pane understand NOTHING about Word.

How anyone who claims expertise in CSS and in the same breath claim they can't understand Word/OO/LO Styles is either a liar or . . . <zip mouth>

Originally Posted by Hitch

Like that absurdly self-absorbed, self-aggrandizing twaddle from Rob Sawyer. Hitch

TL;DR

I read a much better screed extolling the virtues of Wordstar, it wasn't Safire or Mailer, but someone of that ilk and vintage. It was before Evernote, OneNote etc sprinkled ClipThis buttons in our browsers so I don't have a reference - too lazy to search for it.

BR

[najgori]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I wanted to find that guy and slap him silly.

well, that escalated quickly

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by najgori

well, that escalated quickly

Obviously, a figure of speech. Presumably, he's not within head-slapping distance, right? :-) And even if he were, (and yes, he's a member here), it's a comment about his POST, not a threat.

Hitch

[DiapDealer]

In case others are as slow as I am, it appears that @najgori has chosen to communicate using only movie quotes.

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I was appalled at that post that Notjohn linked us to. I mean, talk about arrogant, condescending, patronizing TRIPE. I wanted to find that guy and slap him silly.

I read the linked article. Haughty, you betcha...

But it just seemed like your typical promotion of vim/emacs-type programs compared to WYSIWYG word processors.

For example, earlier this year there was a fascinating post on the LaTeX subreddit, "How I'm able to take notes in mathematics lectures using LaTeX and Vim".

He has GIFs+code examples showing customization that could blow the water out of any Word workflow:

• Text/Code Completion
  
  • Word has AutoFill/AutoComplete
    
  • Take a look at some of his examples:
    
    • Taking into account context (Text/Maths)
      
    • Course-specific substitutions (Physics/Maths)
      
    • Automatically evaluating equations
      
• Overriding Space/Tab functionality
• Snippets
  
  • Word has AutoText/Quick Parts/Building Blocks Organizer
    
• Displaying Equations Source+Images side-by-side
• Syntax Highlighting
  
  • Can also take into account different languages mixed in the same document.
• Mass Spellchecking
  
  • (At the very end of article, he shows an example of correcting spelling mistakes paragraphs at a time.)
    
  • Is such a thing possible in Word? (Probably with macros?) Or do you have to replace one-by-one?
    
  • And is there any way to get Word to remember which squigglies you've Ignored across sessions?

And as I've privately mentioned to Hitch in emails recently:

Flexibility of Plaintext+Version Control (Github) beats the pants off of entire blob comparisons (Word's Track Changes or Compare documents).

In any step along the toolchain, you're not forced into a one program, one way... you're free to use whatever programs you're most comfortable with.

But I do agree, whatever tools you use, best to spend a few hours to boost your productivity many-fold. Styles are one of those easy tools that everyone should learn. :P

(And here's that Word Styles 101 video I always promote. <15 mins and anyone using Word would save themselves many hours of headaches.)

Complete Side Note: Early on document creation was only one-user, one-computer, but that's been changing for quite a while now.

With mobile becoming a lot bigger, and different OSes being intermingled, I think it's even a bigger problem to lock yourself into proprietary tools... or certain antiquated workflows (DOS... lol).

And it's only relatively recently that multi-user + multi-device document editing has been playing catchup (Google Docs, Microsoft Office 365, etc.). To see some of the technical backend issues, see "Interoperable Office Collaboration" given at LibreOffice Conference 2019. Having real-time/online/offline collaboration + trying to bring Git-type functionality into these documents is... "fun".

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Not sure why so many writers believe their craft should be the only one exempt from change/evolution/improvement. I suspect it's mostly dogma masquerading as art. "I can't write a sentence unless it's with Word Star on my Commodore 64 while wearing my favorite slippers."

Originally Posted by BetterRed

After installing Word 2007 (first version with the Ribbon) I learnt more about Word in a year, than I had in decades of using previous versions. So, I'm a Ribbon devotee (hidden of course). Many non-MS Ribbons are pathetic, whilst others are downright diabolical.

I was recently digging into the archives and stumbled across this Microsoft article+talk from 2008, "The Story of the Ribbon" by Jensen Harris:

https://vimeo.com/3305642
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/jen...of-the-ribbon/ (Original article with all its dead links/images glory.)

He explains a lot of the reasoning behind it, shows user-generated usages (out of millions of users across a month, a few things were only clicked on... once), and even shows a lot of the failed prototypes. Interesting stuff.

[KevinH]

For what it is worth, I had some free development time and have added the following features to the next version of PageEdit.

- added ability to insert "id" attibutes into current xhtml file

- added ability to insert hyperlinks to other existing xhtml files
(only when opened with OPF)

- added ability to insert links to **existing** images, audio, and video files
(only when opened with OPF)

These bring back features that previously existed in BookView but that have been adapted to PageEdit's much simpler environment.

So as long as you add the files you want to work with (xhtml, audio, video, images, styles, etc) in Sigil *before* launching PageEdit with the book's OPF tab selected, you should be able to create destinations for links (insert ids), create links to those destinations, and link in existing images, audio, video, etc. right from within PageEdit.

Hope this helps.

BTW, this will pretty much mean that with the next release, PageEdit will have reached "1.0.0" status as it will be feature complete. PageEdit will never have the ability to add new image files, new audio files, new video files, etc, as those require better control and modifications to the OPF and are therefore better suited to be done in Sigil proper first before launching PageEdit (or any other external editor for that matter).

[BetterRed]

BR

[najgori]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

In case others are as slow as I am, it appears that @najgori has chosen to communicate using only movie quotes.

know your meme!

seriously, someone want to teach writers to use styles in word like "select text with mouse, now go to styles, press button... press undo because you also marked text below"? good luck with that, and while you are in office teach them speed typing. double your text, double your money!