Msword V Nisus

From: Normand_Beaudoin@UQTR.UQuebec.CA Date: Sat, 2 Oct 1993 17:58:18 -0400 Subject: Word or Nisus(Summary of answers) Hi! Netters. Few weeks ago I sent a message at info-mac about word processors. I received so many answers that I cannot send a personal reply to each of them. I received so many answers and so many of them were full of attention, full of details and explainations that it make me feel great. So I think the best way to say a usefull "Thank you" is to give you a summary of answers. ( Upon request I could send all the complete answers I received to personal e-mail address) It is not possible to summarize all the comments, details and explaination about each word processor. So I decided to give you a statistical view of what I received. Before doing it I must warn you about the fact that these "statistics" are based on particulars answers to a particular question, so they are certainly biased a little bit. Moreover this bias is probably distorted by the way I compiled answers. So if your favorite word processor received a low score, please don't be angry, but try to get the sweet feeling of the forever ununderstanded poet, alone with the truth and with his/her thousands of friends. Also you should be aware about the fact that these statistic compare very different things: small word processors, large word processors, and software for edition. Incidentally, this is a very deep philosophical problem which bug me all the time and prevent me from sleeping... If you compare totally identical things, it is useless... If you compare completely different things, it is meaningless... How things must be different and how they must be similar for a comparizon to be valid ?????? To fix your mind, I reproduce here the text of the question I sent to infomac. **************** Subject: Microsoft Word or Nisus? I plan to buy, learn, and use a word processor, particularly for a doctoral thesis which will contain text, graphics and pictures. I have a limited time for that job, so I absolutely must not do a mistake with the choice of the word processor I will use. Is there other word processors better than Word or Nisus? What Nisus can do that Word cannot and vice versa? Which one should I choose????? Thank you very much! ***************** Now the statistics! Let me explain shortly the way I did that. When someone recommended a particular software, I gave it a +1 score. For a non recommendation, a -1 score were allowed. For a neutral opinion, I gave a 0. (It happened when one talk about several word processors) After that I compiled the results and normalized to 100%. This gave the unweighted column. It is the base for others columns. Second, I thought that opinions of those who knows and use several word processors should be considered more strongly. So for those how knows n different software, I gave a weight of n to their answers. This gave the linear weight columns. Finally, it seems to me that the opinion of those how knows, …