From: hugh@dciem.dciem.dnd.ca (Hugh D. Gamble)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.applications
Subject: Re: Good, cheap text processors
Keywords: word processing, text processing
Date: 24 Jul 92 20:55:57 GMT
Organization: NTT Systems, Inc., Toronto, Canada

In article <1992Jul21.222823.21252@trl.oz.au> soh@tmp_ip_003.trl.OZ.AU (Soh Kam Hung) writes:
>I'm looking for a PD or cheap text processor for my fianc\'ee.  She
>writes stories and would like a package or editor with the following
>basic features:

You can't beat the emacs/TeX combination for a lot of things.

>1. Automatic word wrap / fill.  (The basic emacs fill isn't sufficient
>though.  See below.) 

Sure it is, see below. :-)

>2. Multiple line spacing on screen and in print.

Does PasTeX have a good previewer?  You could probably use the one
from the Demo version of amigaTeX.

>5. Mouse support for marking, blocking, cut, copy and paste.

emacs may not be the best at that, but it's there.

>7. Multitasks properly and uses ARexx (what else for an Amiga?).

emacs.

>8. Some documentation on the output format so that I can automatically
>translate files to [La]TeX.

There is a "front end" wp for TeX that works with PasTeX, I've seen
posts about, and it's on one of the latest fish disks.  emacs in LaTeX
mode is just fine for me.  You might want to customize some of the
functions to work with PasTeX, likely using AREXX.

>At the moment, I use emacs 18.58 (Amiga port 1.24), but it doesn't

1.25 is around, and 1.26 is in beta test.  There's some nice, user
friendly Workbench support. Drop your doc on the emacs icon, and away
you go.

>automatically fill / wrap a line if the cursor is not on the rightmost
>column, or if characters in a paragraph are deleted.  I've mapped a
>function key to perform a fill-paragraph operation, but my fianc\'ee
>doesn't like using this option too often.  Also, emacs doesn't display

You want M-x auto-fill-mode.  If you want it by default, set it in the
text mode hook in your emacs startup file and it will automatically
be active when you're in text mode, latex mode, etc.
From my startup file:

(setq default-major-mode 'text-mode)
(setq text-mode-hook 'turn-on-auto-fill)

Which, by the way is cut and pasted right out of the emacs.info
hypertext help file (C-h i).  I don't actually know anything about
emacs except how to find everything in the online help functions and
info browser. :-)

>multiple spacing, and mouse and Amiga ANSI console support is minimal.

Multiple spacing is probably doable, but why not just assign a
function key to texify the buffer and put up a preview screen with the
output?  Then you get exect WYSIWYG at the push of a button, but not in
the file you're editing where it can get in the way IMO.

>Soh, Kam Hung, Network Management Research,     |  h.soh@trl.oz.au  
>TRL, POB 249 Clayton, Victoria 3168, Australia  |  +61 3 253 6638

I think you're on the right track with gnuemacs and TeX, but
there are lots of inexpensive WYSIWYG wp/dtp packages for the Amiga
that may be easier to use, and fine for simple things. If you settle
on something else for your wife, don't give up on emacs for you. ;-)

P.S. Add ispell to you emacs setup, there's even an interactive spell check
as you type and auto word completion capability.

And the emacs newsreader, mail reader, directory utility, tetris,
psychoanalyze-pinhead ...




-- 
# Hugh D. Gamble, NTT Systems Inc. (at DCIEM (416) 635-2156) Std. Disclaimers #
# hugh@dciem.dciem.dnd.ca, hugh@kink.UUCP                                    #
# ** Neural net; holds your mind hour after hour. **                          #