Great Tool For Reporters, Photographers & Newsrooms

Somehow I stumbled upon this (I installed it but it would be 6 months before I tried it out) and as a reporter and photojournalist looking for a simple writing tool with lots of features, well this cant be beat.

As a reporter, I can write and it spell checks as I write, which should be standard on all word processing programs.

What amazes me is that when I am done, I can save my story, with photos embedded in the story file and save it as a PDF file. It was simple to do and worked.

I use Evernote when I need an organization tool on all my machines as I write mosty from my iPad4. I havent checked if this app has a version of it for the iOS systems, like my iPad4.

If not, it doesnt make a difference as I have apps on my iPad that can read and convert PDF files into say my Office 365 system. I can work on the story in MS Word (Mobile Verson) and can either reconvert it to a PDF file, or leave it as a Word file as I have access to Office 365 on all my machines and on MAC and Windows operating system.

I also see that there is a version for a UNIX Server. When I get my Apple Xserve G5 Server up and running with access to a tower with 6 other hard drives, I will have to see how it works. Otherwise, I can always create a version to run in websites I plan to host on this machine. (I also was finishing a new script language that will be easier and in tests so far, it out performs PERL, PHP and C/C++). I wrote it in PowerBASIC, and all I need to provide the web server with the .obj files and link it on my machine. It will be in whatever Unix system I choose, and I also will be loading it with Windows 2000 Professional server (I was dissapointed when many of my $10,000 COBOL compilers (CA-Realia, CA Visual COBOL and Microfocus NetExpress stopped working after XP and especially Windows 7), I was unable to start my mainframe emulator. Now I can and offer it to other clients.

Where does Document Writer comes in all this? I will make it my standard editing tool for users to write their own code for their web sites.

I love how simple it is to write in, yet it has some horsepower to go with it.

I have the business version, and I recommend it to all. I may even write about it when I restart my column that I used to write. Now I have a tool that has a quick learning curve. And I bet this can even replace systems like Quark as this writing app allows you to layout an entire newspaper with a lot less headaches, especially with Quarks limiting feature in fitting there text and photos on a page. As I work through all the features, I will update this post, but I may just write about it and put it in my column that I had started a while back before I was disabled due to two failed surgeries.

As zongmeng7423 wrote in his review, I agree that the developer of this app put quality time in its development and has so many features for a writing app. It to will become the most used tool when writing my reports, and converting it as a PDF file with photos means I no longer have to FTP the story and images, and for those papers whose system does not read Meta Data, I have to create a separate file. This witing tool is so rich in features, I can now convert all of what a client needs from me and I can just email it to the editor or directly to the inbox of the copyeditors email.

I will be updating this review as I need to read the documentation that is provided, andf I may find more things that expands my use of it. And if this allows macros or Markup tags, I will be updating this with no information.

And since the program we used to use, News EDit Pro, no longer exists, the only way for papers to use it is if they made the neccessay updates, then I may be able to convince some of them to use this instead. TGhen they can update their Photoshop from 5.0 to what I and other photographers are now using, install some great actions like the Perfect Photo Suite 7 and some of the DxO tools.

This is how important a writing program is at it can keep newsrooms in the dark ages because they fear change will screw everything up. Not with this writing app. By sticking to older machines its forcing us to limit our edits and not to use any of the great photo software out there today.

George from Venice, FL about Document Writer - for Microsoft Word Edition and Open Office Format, v1.4