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On 3/23/2021 at 3:06 PM, garrettm30 said:

But compared to word processors, such as the “king” MS Word, Publisher already does better work at justification, even though it is still on a line-by-line basis. Justification in word processors such as Word and Apple Pages is usually very simple: they also are line-by-line, but handle justification by inter-word spacing alone. Publisher has them beat by also allowing adjustments by letter spacing, not to mention the ability to tweak the values for both kinds of spacing.

This is a test I really had to do. It's just the default settings of both applications involved in this test. Would a bunch of expert users like us be able to tell which one is the layout program, and which one the modern wordprocessor?

image.thumb.png.d641aa8900f3fde96e18689c839c2f5b.png

 

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3 hours ago, Petar Petrenko said:

2. Hyphenation engine should auto detect the language of the word to be hyphenated so we don't need to select specific language for that.

Petar,

Some of us use minority languages. We absolutely need to install and select a specific language. Otherwise...

Regards.

 

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2 hours ago, PaoloT said:

This is a test I really had to do. It's just the default settings of both applications involved in this test. Would a bunch of expert users like us be able to tell which one is the layout program, and which one the modern wordprocessor?

I guess I’ll take the bait. Some observations:

  • Letter spacing as a factor in justification was one of the advantages that I cited Publisher of having over Word, but it appears there is no letter spacing justification in either specimen, whether because the app doesn’t support it or because there is none applied (it seems InDesign has none by default, for example). Subtle letter spacing justification is one of the tools at getting better justification.
  • The line width there is a little over 80 characters per line, which is easier to get good results from justification than shorter line widths common in multicolumn text.
  • The fourth line is the worse offender. A multiline composer (thus, not Publisher) or a human typesetter might bump the last word of the third line for a more balanced result.
  • BUT, hyphenation, which is supported in layout apps and word processors alike, would likely yield the biggest improvement. And here neither specimen benefits from it. So even a word processor could do a better job. 

I think it is important to recognize that justification is inherently a question of compromise, because we are altering lines of different lengths to appear to have the same length. That means extra space has to be added (or even subtracted) in various amounts to get the same apparent length. If the only thing the software can work with is word spacing, then there will be noticeable differences in spacing from one like to the next, such as between the third and the fourth. Instead of only relying on word spacing, also using some small amount of letter spacing, and an even smaller amount of glyph scaling, can make the overall compromise less visually jarring, because you have spread the compromise among more than one factor. Then using a multiline composer can help do a better job on average at a more balanced paragraph because it may opt for a less-than-ideal justification choice higher in the paragraph if it helps to avoid an even worse line further down. Of course, a skilled human typesetter can achieve at least as good as an automatic multiline composer, but here the difference is time spent.

If one of those apps in the comparison is a layout app, then it would seem that none of the features that give it the advantage are being used. I’m not sure what is being proved by showing that a layout app can look like a word processor.

That was fun. Now back to this discussion. Lest it gets buried again, here is another reminder that we already know that footnotes are coming to Publisher.

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On 3/24/2021 at 10:02 AM, fde101 said:

There actually was a version of WordPerfect for classic macOS for a time.  It was never updated for OS X.

There once was a NeXTstep/OpenStep version of WordPerfect, which would have been easy to adapt to OSX, as early OSX versions have been entirely related on NeXT's compiler and library codes. But it wasn't enhanced/developed further in the past, also since Mr. Jobs was later more in favor of Pages.pdf those times. - Of course there were also other powerful word processors, some of which were feature wise very close to DTP software (like OpenWrite).

But the most powerful and professional of all was FrameMaker those days (30 years ago, which offered everything, also specific book project files with TOC, chapter, index, abbreviations, list of figures ... etc. Also drawing, equation builder, bibliography, footnotes/endnotes ...and so on...). Still one of best tools for huge technical book publishing! - No need to say, in the past NeXT times it was Frame Technologies and not Adobe's baby. - Adobe bought the company later and thus got all the insights on how to build, implement and take over certain feature stuff for their InDesign.

 

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Ok, since the comparison is expanding, I will reveal that the left-side example was Apple Pages, and the right-side was AfPublisher. No hyphenation, so not as it should be. But, as I said, it was to see how the same defaults did work.

Maybe we should open a dedicated thread for this discussion? I find it very interesting, and answers like the one from Garrett are extremely informative.

Paolo

 

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12 hours ago, v_kyr said:

But the most powerful and professional of all was FrameMaker

I'm not totally sure FrameMaker can be considered a wordprocessor. But yes, the Mac version was a hybrid between a wordprocessor and a desktop publishing program. You could use it for one task or the other, without feeling too much guilty. It simply could do it. The Windows version abandoned the ease of use and the free-flow of the Mac version, and lost part of this hybrid nature.

Admittedly, nothing has replaced FrameMaker Mac as of now. And I doubt there will be a need for that highly logical type of software, conceived for long distances and complicate structuring of thought, for the foreseeable future.

Paolo

 

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10 hours ago, v_kyr said:

There once was a NeXTstep/OpenStep version of WordPerfect, which would have been easy to adapt to OSX, as early OSX versions have been entirely related on NeXT's compiler and library codes. But it wasn't enhanced/developed further in the past, also since Mr. Jobs was later more in favor of Pages.pdf those times. - Of course there were also other powerful word processors, some of which were feature wise very close to DTP software (like OpenWrite).

But the most powerful and professional of all was FrameMaker those days (30 years ago, which offered everything, also specific book project files with TOC, chapter, index, abbreviations, list of figures ... etc. Also drawing, equation builder, bibliography, footnotes/endnotes ...and so on...). Still one of best tools for huge technical book publishing! - No need to say, in the past NeXT times it was Frame Technologies and not Adobe's baby. - Adobe bought the company later and thus got all the insights on how to build, implement and take over certain feature stuff for their InDesign.

 

And equation solver, too.

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7 hours ago, PaoloT said:

I'm not totally sure FrameMaker can be considered a wordprocessor.

It can be considered as a DTP app specialized for long documents like books, manuals...

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3 hours ago, sfriedberg said:

But it's so nice to have something in this thread that's not "me too" about wanting/needing/craving footnote functionality. 🙂

All considered, who would want badly spaced footnotes! :P

Paolo

 

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10 hours ago, PaoloT said:

I'm not totally sure FrameMaker can be considered a wordprocessor.

No it isn't and wasn't meant above to be a plain word processor in contrast to the other named apps, instead it always was a desktop publishing based professional authoring software for technical documentations. Though you can also just write very good in that, since it also offers everything needed for writing long texts like spell checking, hyphenation, language specific word and line breaks, word & character cout, footnotes/endnotes etc. - FrameMaker is more a professional authoring tool for the administration and print-oriented presentation of technical documents!

FrameMaker.gif

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14 hours ago, PaoloT said:

I'm not totally sure FrameMaker can be considered a wordprocessor. But yes, the Mac version was a hybrid between a wordprocessor and a desktop publishing program. You could use it for one task or the other, without feeling too much guilty. It simply could do it. The Windows version abandoned the ease of use and the free-flow of the Mac version, and lost part of this hybrid nature.

Admittedly, nothing has replaced FrameMaker Mac as of now. And I doubt there will be a need for that highly logical type of software, conceived for long distances and complicate structuring of thought, for the foreseeable future.

Paolo

 

"I'm not totally sure FrameMaker can be considered a wordprocessor. " 

Meh,  potato-potatoe...

Labelling it however you deem fit doesn't detract from where we are now... can publisher do what we want? No.

Do I care whether FM19, ID<whatever>, or Notepad++ can do it? No, not at all.

Word can do most of what I want to (and had been more than capable for many years), but oftentimes I want something better...

Can Publisher do it? Yes/no.

If no, is it on the cards? Yes/no.

No offense, but I don't give a monkey's about Framemaker, InDesign, Quark, or the rest of them - can Publisher do what I want? If the answer's yes, then great; if not, then it's a balance...
 

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13 hours ago, PaoloT said:

Maybe we should open a dedicated thread for this discussion?

7 hours ago, sfriedberg said:

I agree this topic (high-end justification) should probably have its own thread.

I would suggest this thread as focusing specifically on better justification. Glyph spacing and a multiline composer are a couple features that are discussed that are not currently available in Publisher:

 

I will follow the suggestion by PaoloT and sfriedberg and carry on this particular discussion in the thread I have l linked above.

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12 minutes ago, HGF said:

😬  Still no footnotes in V1.9.2. Does anybody know when we'll get this?

None of us do, and Serif's habit is to generally not promise anything until we see it show up in a beta. I am pretty well certain we will not see it in 1.9.x, as any further updates to the 1.9 line will just be bug fixes. I think it may be a few weeks at least before we see the first beta of the next major update, whether it is styled 1.10 or a paid 2.0 update. Even then, we cannot be sure that footnotes will be in the next major round of feature updates. All we know is that they are being worked on, and that the last we heard they were not yet ready.

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I would expect that the 2.0 upgrade will contain some pretty good improvements and additions, otherwise it's unlikely that many people will decide to pay for the new version. So I think/hope it may well have footnotes/endnotes (if not before).

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Suggestion on footnote calls: to be able to add a footnote on an indexed expression.

Example: Aix de Denée¹⁷⁹, Marie-Emmanuelle d’

 

note-de-bas-de-page-index.png

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  • 3 weeks later...

Yesterday I copied text into Publisher and manually added footnotes.

I have one outstanding problem with the text, and I can't see how to fix it.  After adding the footnotes, I drew a short line above the footnotes on each page, to separate them from the main text.  On the first text page I then had to add an additional footnote, so I moved the bottom boundary of the main text box up, no problem.  I then moved the top boundary of the footnote text box up, again, no problem.


But I was not able to move or delete the the short line above the footnotes, which now is a line through some of the text of the second footnote.

I have researched this and tried all sorts of options, but the line appears to be locked and Publisher does not allow me to untick the layer, cut it, change its colour (to white, was my idea!) or move it to the trash.

I wonder if someone could look at it for me.  If so, I will attach the file to my reply.

Thank you!

Trevor

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37 minutes ago, Trevor A said:

If so, I will attach the file to my reply.

Attaching a file may prompt users of this forum to have a look at what's gone wrong with your file.

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44 minutes ago, Trevor A said:

Yesterday I copied text into Publisher and manually added footnotes.

I have one outstanding problem with the text, and I can't see how to fix it.  After adding the footnotes, I drew a short line above the footnotes on each page, to separate them from the main text. 

I would make a couple of Paragraph Styles for the foot notes. Call one Footnote First Paragraph and the other  Footnote Paragraphs. I would base Footnote First Paragraph on Footnote Paragraph and change only the decorations section, use the decoration Line above sized to what you want. Then apply the Footnote First Paragraph to the first paragraph on that page.

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