[Libreoffice-bugs] [Bug 33173] Tabbed UI (Writer): Division/section-per-tab (similar to Lotus WordPro)

Fri Dec 6 12:21:42 UTC 2019

https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=33173

--- Comment #45 from roland at logikalsolutions.com ---
(In reply to Heiko Tietze from comment #41)
> I don't see the advantage over the Navigator [1] or master documents [2].
> Users who are familiar with one kind of interaction may prefer this but
> there is no requirement missing, AFAICS. So the suggestion is to not change
> what we have (and where other users are familiar with).
> And while we have some interest in the topic, it's at the same time quite
> old and of less importance for the whole product. So setting back to medium.
> 
> [1]
> https://help.libreoffice.org/6.3/en-US/text/swriter/guide/arrange_chapters.
> html?&DbPAR=WRITER&System=UNIX
> [2]
> https://help.libreoffice.org/6.3/en-US/text/swriter/guide/globaldoc_howtos.
> html?DbPAR=WRITER#bm_id3145246

Well, first you would have to begin to understand that comparing Navigator and
master documents to TABBED DIVISIONS is like comparing pre-1700 flintlocks to
nuclear weapons.

Please do not assume a tab is a tab is a tab is a tab. Nothing could be further
from the truth.

If yourself and the powers that be want LO to never be more than something to
write letters home to mom from summer camp with, then so be it. These are the
kinds of word processors that don't get donations from people who write as part
of their living. I used to donate but I stopped a while back when it became
obvious LO wasn't interested in chasing the market of professional writers. Am
I wrong?

I've written quite a few books over the years. Not as many as some, but more
than most, especially those who utter the phrase "I have half a novel in a
drawer somewhere."

http://theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/

I will be the first to admit LO has achieved the functionality (sans reveal
codes) of Word Perfect 3 for DOS. Laying out a book was nearly impossible, but
it was the best we had. It forced us to use the archaic manuscript format with
a lot of publisher specific back-end processing.

Most will probably admit LO has achieved the functionality (sans reveal codes)
of Word Perfect 5 for OS/2. Laying out a book was somewhat ham fisted, but it
was a Godsend compared to other tools. That's the word processor I used to
create this title:

https://theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/zincit_book.html

The original draft (which took a year of writing) for this book
https://theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/app_book.html
was written with Lotus WordPro. You may wish to note that it is on Dr. Dobb's
list of recommended reading for all developers:
https://www.drdobbs.com/tools/developers-reading-list/232500396?pgno=6

I can tell you that book would have never been written, or at least completed,
without tabbed divisions to store all research in. The final version had to be
ported to Word Perfect because LWP didn't have a built in PDF creator and the
reasonably priced "fake printer drivers" which generated PDF files weren't
worth a fart in the wind back then.

The professional writer's market has been screaming for the return of LWP for a
very long time. IBM simply doesn't care about the PC market anymore. Your
Navigator came from IBM. They wanted a new editor for Lotus Notes and OO simply
wasn't even close to the task. Once they had Lotus Symphony working quite well,
they promptly abandoned it just like they abandoned Lotus SmartSuite when it
was a mighty fine office suite.

How bad has the professional writing world been screaming? So much so that a
company has launched a Windows and Mac only off-shoot. They didn't keep the
Linux beta. I see they've learned their lesson about pricing now too.
https://www.literatureandlatte.com/store/scrivener?tab=Windows

When I first looked into that they were charging Word Perfect professional
edition prices. Yeah, I have a lot of copies of Word Perfect laying around. Any
time a client forces me to put the virus known as Windows on one of my
machines. For professional writing I don't touch Microsoft products, not if I
can avoid it.

Professional writers have a short list of things they need.

Running page headers and footers which are specific to a page style. (LO has
this)

A decent spell checker (LO using external thing which isn't as good as the
spell checkers for most commercial word processors, at least it isn't for
American English. Probably has a lot to do with the thing trying to stuff
British into the same dictionary. There's American and there is British. They
are remarkably different.)

Nice selection of fonts (LO has this)

Automatic grammar checker which flags odd spacing, double words, etc.(Jury
still out on this.)

TABBED DOCUMENT DIVISIONS to store research, deleted scenes, etc. in within the
same document file YET CAN BE INDIVIDUALLY HIDDEN FROM PRINTING AND EXPORTING.
Draggable so each tabbed division can contain a chapter. Re-arranging chapters
is simply moving tabs. The word processor must recognize tab moves and update
page numbering accordingly. Likewise, when a tab is hidden, no matter where it
is, it's pages are not counted during page numbering.  (LO doesn't have
anything remotely close to this.)

Ability to generate an acceptable to Barnes & Noble as well as other sites EPUB
from visible content. (LO does not have this. Yeah, there's an extension
https://extensions.libreoffice.org/extensions/writer2epub
but it got 399 downvotes for a reason.)

Ability to directly generate a PDF which a commercial printing house can
directly consume. (LO pretty much has this. I haven't had one be rejected in
years, perhaps others still have issues, but I don't)

Envelop and label printing because we have to send a lot of stuff physically.
(LO seems sporadic here. I don't know for certain because I stopped using it
for envelops and labels years ago given all of the problems.)

That's really it.

Utopia would be the ability to turn on/run through, a complete Chicago Manual
of Style check, but that is Utopia.

Please take some time looking up the titles found here: 

http://theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/

on bn.com for page count and release dates. Also note that this title

https://theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/app_book.html

and this title

https://theminimumyouneedtoknow.com/soa_book.html

are award winning. None of the others are. Want to know why? I used LWP to
create them, then I suffered all of the ham-fisted conversion issues to get
them into electronic forms remote editors and print houses could use.

All of the others either used WP or OO or LO. They aren't award winning because
of the tools. I got tired of all the ham-fisted conversion issues. I also
didn't know the tricks for getting LWP installed on newer versions of Windows
in VMs and Wine was hit or miss.

The result of using tools that are not up to the task, research, undecided
content, scraps, and clippings all had to be stored in separate
files/directories. When you are moving around to various office desktops at
various locations around the country, and back and forth to laptops, guess what
happens? ()*&(* gets lost. Project backups start getting incomplete because you
have to keep remembering what is and isn't important.

Yes, my technical book series covers some obscure topics. It isn't going to put
me in Harry Potter money, but it needs to be written to keep systems
functioning that everybody depends on. (I don't know the current states, but,
excluding Russia, at one point OpenVMS was the OS running every nuclear power
plant in the world as well as most of the steel and paper mills. It's still a
really high percentage and the knowledge needs to be passed on.)

While twenty-something me would never have admitted this, fifty-something me
knows it to be obvious truth: 

You can't really design a word processor until you've been a professional
writer and professional means a whole lot more than just getting paid to do it.

Putting soap box back in the closet now.

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