Re: ...a comparison, ...please.

[Robert Hemenway <robhem>]

At 04:50 PM 12/30/98 -0400, M.W. Poirier wrote:
>
>
>   Since you mention XYWrite, in conjunction with NB, in your post below,
>   would you mind giving a _very_ brief comparison of the two programmes?
>   I'm relatively new to NB (I got 4.5 last spring).  However, I have
>   noticed that NB and XYWrite are often mentioned together.

Well, you could get a much better answer from others here.

NB is a highly modified version of XyWrite, adapted for scholarly use. It
is somewhat less "open" than XyWrite. XyWrite can be adapted in a great
many ways. NB is what it is, carefully tuned to perform the functions
academic writers must have. Some or many of its specialized functions are
fixed and not readily modified. The great strength of XyWrite is in its
adaptability and its programming language.

I'm all thumbs when it comes to writing XyWrite programs, except for simple
search- and-replace routines, but there are many ingenious ones available.
Drop in at www.serve.com/xywweb, which is maintained by two dedicated
XyWriters, if you'd like to see what add-on programs are to be had.

The differences between a file formatted in XyW and one formatted in NB are
fairly substantial, though I have the impression from what little I've seen
that NB for Windows files will be somewhat more like XyWrite files. NB will
be using an SZ delta for type sizes, as recent versions of Xy do. That sort
of thing. As it is now, I can shift files back and forth between one
program and the other via an s&r macro--so long as formatting is fairly light.

I believe, though I'm not sure, that the DOS version of NB is based on
XyWrite 3.5. XyWrite was modified a good deal in Xy 4 and in XyWin. Some
see the changes as improvements. Others disagree. There are those who still
swear by the earlier Xy version. Faster, crisper, simpler.

Couldn't tell you whether I prefer Xy or NB. Depends on what the work is.

NB with Lingua is far superior to anything XyWrite can offer. Ditto Orbis.
Ditto Ibid.

Still, I've managed to work easily with West European diacritics in XyWrite
by putting all the characters on the Xy keyboard (in the NB positions), and
I've added East European, Turkish, etc. diacritics by acquiring or
modifying a few fonts.

The principal difference now between the two programs may be that Nota Bene
has  strong, solid support. XyWrite, as I understand it, is being developed
now only as a specialized and rather costly word processor for law offices.
We've been told that the somewhat improved version of XyWrite for Windows
that has resulted will be available for XyWriters one day. Maybe even next
month. We'll see.

Regards,
RH