Word processing in Tiger?

Hello.

AppleWorks can fill most ever need for the average person. Otherwise, look at MicroSoft Office for Mac.


-Apple //GS

Hi U.D. I believe you should be able to use TextEdit. This can be found within the Applications folder. It is pretty basic, but fine for a lot of word processing needs. Good Luck

MBP 1.83 Mac OS X (10.4.7) Quiet, Cool, Re-furbished

Hello Ugly Duckling,
For basic word processing, TextEdit is built into Mac OS X. It can do most kinds of formating, and has basic print and save functionality.

If you want to pay for a word processor, you may want to consider Apple's iWork '06 for $79. It includes Pages, which has many cool features to create beautiful documents in minutes. No list of Mac word processors would be complete without a mention of Microsoft's Office 2004 for Mac ($399.95, the educational version is $149.95), which is by far the de facto standard for word processing.

If you are aiming more along the lines of a free word processor, you may want to consider Abiword or NeoOffice, which both include open source word processors. Abiword is a little leaner and nicer if you want just word processing, but NeoOffice includes a fuller suite of applications, beyond just the word processor.

Good luck,
Daniel Cox

12" PowerBook G4 (1.33GHz) Mac OS X (10.4.7)

If you are looking for a free word processor / office suite, a great one to try is Neo Office. It is free because it is known as "open source" - meaning many programmers across the world work together to make a great product. Since it is free, there is no formal support, but discussion forums much like this one are available on their site.

Here is more info:
http://www.planamesa.com/neojava/en/index.php

And here is a direct download link:
ftp://mirrors.dotsrc.org/neooffice/NeoOffice-2.0Alpha4-PowerPC.dmg

Best Regards,
Eric

TextEdit should be in your Applications folder. A freeware word processor is AbiWord; more advanced word processors include NisusWriter Express and of course Microsoft Word. If you accidently erased your old program without having a backup, you should be able to install it again from your original CDs.

bd

I use Nisus Writer Express which I find to be very excellent for my purposes.

You might like to check it out.

One word of caution about AppleWorks is that I suspect it won't remain in production for too long now.

Anyway Nisus Writer Express can be got here if you're interested:

http://www.nisus.com/

It costs $69.95 to download.

There are many good things about it. Notably it saves files as RTF which means that they can be read by other word processors.



intel iMac 20" Mac OS X (10.4.7)

Hi, Ugly Duckling.

You won't find many that offer as robust a set of functions as Microsoft Word. It's also something of a standard in the publishing business. Some publishers may require you to submit your works in Word documents.

As noted earlier, TextEdit is the basic word processing app included with Mac OS X. IMO, it is a poor substitute for a true word processing application, such as Microsoft Word, for any but the most basic documents.

The following applications are frequently mentioned in discussions of MS Word alternatives. They each have their adherents and fans. In alphabetical order:

• AbiWord
• AppleWorks, essentially been superseded by Pages.
• Mellel
• Mariner Write
• Nissius Writer Express
• Pages, part of Apple's new iWork bundle.
• Ulysses

Some additional "office suite" alternatives that are regularly mentioned include:

• ThinkFree Office
• NeoOffice: a free prototype of a port of OpenOffice to Mac OS X.

You can investigate other solutions by searching MacUpdate or Version Tracker. The user-submitted reviews accompanying the listings can be helpful in sorting the wheat from the chaff.

You must compare your requirements against the features of each package to determine the one that best meets your needs.

PS: I suggest you change the info in your Apple profile from "M8812LL/A" to reflect that you have an "iMac FP 17-inch, 800 MHz G4." Most folks answering questions do not know the model number. Click "My Settings" in the "Welcome your screenname" box in the upper-right corner of this page, then add those details to the "Computer" field therein. Use the "Other Computer Information" field if additional space is required.

Good luck!

😉 Dr. Smoke
Author: Troubleshooting Mac® OS X

What about the problems of very slow speed with Appleworks 6.2.9 in Tiger 10.4.7 ?

There must be a programme to allow old OS9.2 docs. to be accessed

Alternatively, how can I return to Panther where I have original CDs and stop Tiger ?

Thanks for the info.

pet29alex

Many users including myself don't have a speed problem with AppleWorks in OS 10.4.7 so it should be possible to get your system up to speed.

Two possibilities that come to mind are:
1) The "Recent Items" folder is overfull
2) Maybe you need more RAM (AppleWorks runs in Rosetta)

But my main suggestion is that you pose this question on the
AppleWorks forum where resident experts will most likely be able to advise you.

What word processing package were you using before you "wiped the slate clean" on your Mac?

If you find TextEdit limited for your use, there are some free text editors (wouldn't call any of them true word processors) that are much more feature packed.

IMO, one of the best is TextWrangler ( http://www.barebones.com/products/textwrangler/ ), by the makers of (the commercial) BBEdit.