Filed under: Software, Productivity, Beta Beat
Nisus Writer Pro Beta available
Nisus Writer was a serious old-school classic Mac word processor with a devoted following. In the OS X era Nisus introduced Nisus Writer Express, which has a somewhat more limited feature set, but they promised a more powerful version, Nisus Writer Pro. It has has now finally arrived as a public beta. The new features (above Express) include support for Table of Contents, Indexing, Bookmarks, Floating Graphics and more. I have recently settled into Mellel as my anti-MS Word writing program of choice, but now it looks like I'm going to have give Nisus Writer Pro a full evaluation.The Nisus Writer Pro beta is now available for download. The final price of Pro has not been announced, but in what seems to be related news, they've lowered the price of Express to $45.
[Via MacNN]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
rds said 9:18PM on 4-12-2007
I bought Nisus Writer Express a while back but stopped using it in favour of Word. I've been using the Pro beta most of today and so far it's been excellent. This could finally be the native OS X word processor I've been waiting for.
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frosty said 9:23PM on 4-12-2007
I've tried out Express and found it promising if insufficient, and I'm very much looking forward to evaluating the Pro version.
But one thing I've never understood: for people who are obviously Mac-heads, how was it possible to make such an ugly icon?
http://images.google.com/images?q=ftd+logo
I'm not kidding, and I don't think it's trivial. Having something that atrocious in the Dock just screws with my whole vibe. Sure, most of the TUAW readers know how to fix the icon, but still...
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Nik said 9:51PM on 4-12-2007
The link for Mellel is bad
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Mark Thomas said 10:21PM on 4-12-2007
The icon, yeah — it was like the FreeHand dude escaped and turned into a writer. The Nisus Writer Pro icon is an improvement. Looks right at home in the dock.
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Rob said 10:23PM on 4-12-2007
What abput the free AbiWord OpenSource Word Pro, OpenOffice or NeoOffice? All are open source and work great.
Bit since OpenOffice and NeoOffice are Java based, the first time the program is launched it can take some time before the program is loaded.
As a result, I prefer AbiWord for most of my day to day Word Pro needs.
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Dr Other said 12:01AM on 4-13-2007
I've been using Pages for awhile now, but it doesn't really do the job for note-taking and lists. I grabbed Nisus and within a minute had set note-taking up exactly to my liking. I even have bullets toggled with Command - [ which works perfect. The icon is sleek, as is the program. This IS the word app I was looking for.
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Mark Thomas said 12:17AM on 4-13-2007
The open source word processors have a lot of functionality and are useful free Word replacements, but they're by no stretch of the imagination Mac-like. I've been poking around Nisus Writer Pro and it looks and feels like a first-rate OS X app. Very nice.
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hmurchison said 2:10AM on 4-13-2007
I'm not even a word processing aficionado but I must admit Nisus Writer Pro has some features that have caught my eye. I like the way they've used their Thesaurus and the layout is nice. I don't need a Microsoft Word clone. I need something that can anticipate my needs well. This is a very good start for Nisus. I think this product will be successful.
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Nick said 4:04AM on 4-13-2007
If Nisus is still using rtf as its document format then a new version is of limited interest to me.
Without an XML format, it's not possible for styling information to be preserved in the document. Microsoft's old rtf is quite widely recognized, but it is only for *formatting*; it does not allow you to *structure* a document properly. Moreover, it doesn't allow you to return to a document at a later date and change its appearance by associating a new stylesheet with the structural information preserved in the document - because it doesn't preserve structural information.
Using rtf is in 2007 is like using "tag-soup" HTML3.2 replete with tables, spacing hacks, and spacer gifs on the web instead of using HMTL 4.01 and CSS.
Serious word-processor use requires an XML format - either one such as Mellel uses or the Open Document format Open Office Writer uses.
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Jeff said 4:36AM on 4-13-2007
If only someone would build an MS Word alternative that played nice with the commenting and track changes features of Word. I would switch in an instant! For now though, I seem forever stuck with the POS that Microsoft has handed us.
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Danny said 7:36AM on 4-13-2007
I'm probably in a minority (at least among TUAW readers) but I'm stuck with Word for the time being. I'd love to move over to Nisus -- and did use it a bit back in the OS 9 times -- but on older hardware (G3 iBook 600Mhz) it runs like a mosquito through molasses. And the same is true of all the open sources projects mentioned in the comments + Apple's Pages. I find myself a bit puzzled by this. I mean, it's only word processing. My little box manages to cope with InDesign 2.0 without too much strain so, to my mind, no word processing application should give it any trouble at all. Anyone know what that's about??
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Gary said 12:04AM on 4-16-2007
The only complaint I have about Pro is that it has been diverting my attention from other things in life as I play with it on older documents. I've been adding Tables of Content and Indexes to academic works that needed them, and have been reading the User Guide (included in the disk image) and trying all the new features.
NW Pro has also taken me away from spending time with MS Word. (Not that I'm complaining, of course.)
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