Simple Text Editors?

[AudaciousVagabond]

For the longest time I've simply used a combination of Microsoft Word and WordPad for almost all of my written work. But while I find Word becoming progressively more and more cluttered with each new iteration, I find Word Pad to be (seemingly purposely) lacking in features while still retaining the same annoyances as Word. So my question to you all would be, what's a nice and simple word editor that you could recommend. My thanks in advance!

 

[Steerpike]

FocusWriter is very nice. Simple and clean.

 

[Noma Galway]

You can remove quite a bit from the Ribbon on Word, if the clutter is your major issue.

 

[Feo Takahari]

There's always the George R.R. Martin approach: Wordstar 4.0 on DOS.

More seriously, AbiWord might be to your taste, though it's a bit simple for me. (I use OpenOffice, but I admit it's a bit cluttered.)

 

[Steerpike]

More seriously, AbiWord might be to your taste, though it's a bit simple for me. (I use OpenOffice, but I admit it's a bit cluttered.)

You might like Kingsoft office better (also free), or maybe the OpenOffice fork LibreOffice, which I think is slightly better than OO.

 

[CupofJoe]

There's always the George R.R. Martin approach: Wordstar 4.0 on DOS.

Still my best/favourite WP. But distance/time may be lending rosy tinted memories...

 

[Svrtnsse]

I too use OpenOffice. I've heard others say LibreOffice is better. But for now I'm feeling like I don't have a need to fix what's not broken. I've gotten used to the little quirks and annoyances and they're part of the experience of writing now.

 

[Steerpike]

I too use OpenOffice. I've heard others say LibreOffice is better. But for now I'm feeling like I don't have a need to fix what's not broken. I've gotten used to the little quirks and annoyances and they're part of the experience of writing now.

They're not vastly different in terms of how you use them, but LibreOffice has had a faster development cycle and has been improved more quickly (because for a while OpenOffice as basically stagnant, and some of the OpenOffice developers went to LibreOffice to produce the fork when it looked like OpenOffice might die). With the faster cycle, I think LO is more on top of changes in the technology, and has better MSOffice compatibility, but so long as what you're using works it probably doesn't matter much.

 

[Jabrosky]

Often I will use Notepad to type out the early drafts, but then transfer the text to Word or OpenOffice to make a file I can send to other people (yes, a .txt file straight from Notepad can be sent too, but most people are used to .doc these days).

 

[Trick]

I write by hand and then dictate into MS word. I like word processors for editing but not for initial creation - feels too much like high school I guess.

 

[ThinkerX]

I run my stories through 'ProWritingAid' and 'Grammarly'. They are far from perfect, but are good at things like spotting adverbs, overused words, and missing apostrophe's - the bane of my existence.

 

[AudaciousVagabond]

Thanks a million for all the suggestions!

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

I use either Word 2000 on my desktop, or more often Libre Office on my laptop. I find them both to be good basic word processors. Many people seem to recommend scrivener - I've not tried it. My only cautionary note would be whatever program you write and format in, make sure the final version for uploading is in Word 1997 - 2003 format (.doc files).

Cheers, Greg.