which word processor is the best

[honx]

well, i have here:
wordworth 7, finalwriter 97, amiga writer from haage & partner, final copy 2 and kind words 3.
which one of them is the best, has the most or the best features? which one should i install?

[TroyWilkins]

Why not install them all and try them out to see which one you prefer?
What features are important to you, what system will you be running them on?

[honx]

i'm running amigaos 3.9 with official boingbags 1+2 and inofficial boingbags 3+4 in winuae.
well, first i'll try amiga writer and wordworth 7 which are the newest ones (2000 and 1998).
so in these applications should be most features included i guess.

[Sandro]

why you want a word processor in the Amiga?
such stuff is useless , they can't even read 90% of the MS Office files

[gulliver]

My personal preference is WordsWorth 7.x because it has a very usefull feature that is the "learn" spelling so you are not limited to built-in spelling correction dicitionaries and can create your own (which is great if your language is not supported).

I usually export to RTF format and in this way I can easily exchange with any modern Office suite.

FinalWriter97 was always my second choice.

BTW both wordprocessors can edit simple html webpages, which is rather handy.

[existentia]

After you try them all, maybe you should write an article about the features and disadvantages of each. Or at least let us know which you chose and why.

[jPV]

I prefer FinalWriter 97. It has elegant GUI and does what I need for basic word processing, and I think it doesn't lose with features either. It has really fine printing output too, in old times it was way better than other programs did, and still does really good job on today's laser printers.

Sometimes I've also used Amiga Writer, and while it's pretty fine program, I still feel more like home with FW97 and keep launching it by default. FW was developed much longer, so it also feels more mature software. If I need some quick good quality printout I always go for FW97.

Why I still use these? Because I mostly create documents and printable material myself, so I don't need mainstream compatibility at home. And I don't want to turn on PCs or Macs just for doing a page or two for printing something, because I mostly use Amigas and compatibles at home. So, perfectly fine for my use and not useless at all!

[JJKom]

FinalWriter is still the best. It has lot of things that requires gfx program on Win, like ability to wrap text on pre-defined path, fontsize variable (change any ONE letter to any width), from 1% up in 1% steps without changing height or font size. Very easy to produce professional looking posters etc.

[frank_b]

I like Transwrite. No frills, very fast with word perfect import/export.

[paul1981]

Originally Posted by Sandro

why you want a word processor in the Amiga?
such stuff is useless , they can't even read 90% of the MS Office files

What a stupid reply. He wants to word process on his Amiga, like many do. Why should MS Office or Open office or whatever else compatibility matter? Amiga has its own formats for documents. ;-)

You might as well have said 'why use a 25+ year old computer at all for anything?'

[EugeneNine]

It would be nice to have openoffice compatibility, all my documents are already in that format.
I thought I saw somewhere that abiword had an amiga version.

[existentia]

Openoffice documents are just archives of XML files and maybe some images if they're embedded. I think it's documented somewhere. The difficulty would be with the Amiga side, with those file formats being undocumented.

[dirkies]

WP 4.2 was my workhorse back then (during my university years). No need for fancy graphics, just text, but very powerful in that! And interchangeable with fellow students using WP on their PC.

[honx]

you mean wordperfect 4.1? v4.1.12 was the latest amiga release as far i know...

[dirkies]

Could be right, I do know I used a 4.2 one, could be a fake, as there was also a 100% fake relabeled v5.0.
But the 4.2 was maybe genuine, it was released at the very end of 1989 according to my boilerroom logs:

WP42A.WRP N 505187 12-30-89 WordPerfect 4.2 disk 1/3
WP42B.WRP N 695226 12-30-89 WordPerfect 4.2 disk 2/3
WP42C.WRP N 361377 12-30-89 WordPerfect 4.2 disk 3/3

[honx]

according to https://amigalove.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=117 version 4.2 of wordperfect was not released for amiga anymore.
http://www.columbia.edu/~em36/wpdos/chronology.html is also a good source for information about wordperfect versions available.
according to history page mentioned above, the latest amiga release of wordperfect was version 4.1.12 dated around january 1991.
version 5.0 was an alpha test which was never released. circulating "wordperfect 5.0" releases seem to be exact v4.1.12 copies.

Originally Posted by amigalove.com

Upon doing some heavy research I found a Columbia University archive listing the version history of WordPerfect. It notes 5.0 for the Amiga was an alpha test and never saw release. This is yet another example of the sorry state of our online Amiga collections. They rarely note important things like NTSC/PAL designs, or in this case, if something was an unreleased version. It should be noted that version 5.0 would most likely be an exact copy of the last official Amiga WordPerfect release, which was version 4.1.12 released in January of 1991.

[dirkies]

yeah, probably right, but it served me well over the years, 4.1.2 or fake 4.2
Especially the fact you could virtually write your own printer driver with it (thanks to every function/character you could reprogram within WP printing tool to match the command string for your printer) making your printer a lot more versatile vs the standard drivers included.

[honx]

but you're quite right as well, you actually had some kind of v4.2, because as i just found out:
versions 4.1.11 and 4.1.12 of amiga wordperfect are equivalent to v4.2 of dos wordperfect!

[tokalash]

Interested in digging up some productivity software, I tried a bunch of word processors a while ago. I have come to really like Excellence! even though it looks pretty oldfashioned. In the late 90s I lked Final Writer 97.

[dirkies]

I believe WP did not work ok on my A4000 (display issues) which forced me to move to Final Writer.