Making general-purpose word processing tools behave as structured editors remains an important issue. In most organisations and companies, documents are currently produced with advanced word processor software running on performant personal systems. Such document production has succeeded to text processing on dumb terminals, which themselves had already replaced electronic and mechanical typewriters. Todays' word processors offer an increasing range of layout and presentation features which, in combination with modern high-resolution printers, make it possible to obtain almost typeset quality output. Almost any organisation or company has sought to restrict the inventivity of typists and authors by imposing a consistent look of the documents being produced.
Prescriptions range from a set of simple rules to an elaborated house style.
Modern word processors also offer improved programming interfaces. Often, system administrators have created specific style sheets, word processor templates and even quite complex customisations. Their approach is based on layout and presentation features. In a number of cases, word processor customisations can benefit from more formal methods based on the Standard Generalized Markup Language. This point of view will be presented in the following sections.