TextMaker Makes Strong Showing as Linux Word Processor

By: Rob Reilly
Thursday, July 3, 2003 10:07:44 AM EST
URL: http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reviews/4890/1/

Fast and Easy, Too

Need an easy-to-use word processor on Linux, that loads in a matter of seconds and pulls in Word documents without any fuss?

That's where TextMaker from Softmaker shines. Although there are other word processing packages that have similar features, none start as quickly as TextMaker. Well... I guess you could use vi. That's faster.

Seriously, fast application load times can be a real productivity boost, especially for the word processor only user. Mobile users carrying around a laptop also hate to wait for their word processor whenever they power up in a new location.

As Linux desktops replace other systems, one of the first applications a business owner thinks about is word processing. Many offices don't use spreadsheets, drawing or presentation tools on a regular basis. OpenOffice.org offers all of these in a nice integrated package. And it's available for free download. It's a great package, but OpenOffice.org could be a little overkill for some users.

The TextMaker application is virtually painless to load and use. It has all of the great features of a mainstream word processor, including text and graphics formatting, lots of cool fonts, and merging capabilities. I found the package so consistent with other word processor interfaces that anyone ought to be able to start it up and use it productively in a matter of minutes.

I don't think a rehashing of word processing is appropriate for this story, so instead I want to focus on some of TextMakers's more useful and labor saving features. I'll also point out some areas that might present difficulties for readers.

You want easy? Here we go.

Loading The Program

To say TextMaker is easy is an incredible understatement. Loading the program on your Linux machine is the essence of simplicity. You can either download a trial version or order the CD from the Softmaker download page. When you decide to purchase the trial version, or get the CD, it will cost you €49.95 if you are in Europe or US$49.95 if you are outside of Europe.

One thing potential customers should note: the trial version is crippleware, as saving to Word or RTF formats is disabled until you kick up to the full version.

I simply popped the CD into the drive and mounted the disk to /cdrom, as root. Next, I copied the tml02.tgz file to the /usr/local/bin directory. Then, I unpacked TextMaker with the following command:

tar xzvf tml02.tgz

Next, I just did a cd into the newly created TextMaker directory and typed:

./tml

First time TextMaker users will then need to put in your name, email and serial number during the first load to make the program operational.

The program took an astounding 2.5 seconds to come up on my old 300-MHz PII laptop. How's that for fast? Life on a laptop just doesn't get any better. Putting TextMaker to work was almost as easy as getting it on my machine.

Using TextMaker

TextMaker's look and feel is like many other word processing programs, in Linux, as well as Windows. (As a matter of fact, TextMaker comes in a Windows version, too.) Softmaker uses task and object "strips" instead of task bars, but they are functionally the same thing. The layout of the TextMaker working screen is pretty standard with the usual groups of buttons at the top with line number, chapters, sections and columns at the bottom.

New documents are started in a straightforward fashion. Simply start the program and a clean edit screen will appear, all ready for you to start typing in your document. Likewise, if you want to edit a Microsoft file, click on File, then Open and select your .doc file. TextMaker also can pull in standard text files.

You can save files as native TextMaker (.tmd) format and as various flavors of Microsoft Word. Standard text (.txt) and HTML 4 formats are also supported. The native OpenOffice.org (.sxw) format is not supported, however, and doesn't even show up on the "view all files" list box.

TextMaker could be a reasonable HTML editor for an average person creating an occasional Web page or two. I found that the generated HTML tended to be pretty "wordy" as far as specifying fonts, font sizes and so on. And it didn't indent or group things like lists very well. I was happy to see a page printed from TextMaker (native format) looks almost identical to the same HTML formatted page displayed on a browser. Most other word processors produce HTML code that approximates the native printed document, but never really seems to get it quite right. Softmaker seems to have done a good job with their implementation.

One interesting use I found for TextMaker happened when I was cruising Web sites. Some Web sites offer various Word files as how-to's, product descriptions and general information about products. I configured Mozilla to view .doc files in TextMaker and now I can see Word files nearly instantly.

What I Liked

One feature I really liked was the synonym lookup button on the main task strip. As a writer, I frequently search for alternative words to describe what I'm trying to say. To use the function, place the cursor on the word and then click the AB XY? button. The window contains the word, a little "meaning" reference window and the available synonyms. I thought a nice touch was the placement of a replace button right in the pop-up window, in case you wanted to change to one of the synonyms.

Do you need to do a quick calculation on some numbers and them stick them in your document? Just place your cursor where you want the result and click the calculation drop-down under the Insert task strip. A window will appear that you can use for normal arithmetic functions. You can develop some pretty complicated formulas using this tool. What's more, once the result is inserted in your text, you can edit it by highlighting and then the insert, calculation sequence again. The window will pop up with your formula ready to edit.

Working with graphics files seemed to be very easy. I inserted a few .png and .jpeg files into a couple of documents without any problem. The rendering on the screen (in the document) was great and appeared very quickly, even on my tired old laptop. Resizing and moving images, likewise were a snap. Just grab a corner and move or resize it. There was virtually no repainting time for the image and no funky artifacts left over after the move.

Overall a nice, truly easy program to use. There were a few areas, though, that caused me some problems.

Areas That Might Cause You Difficulty

A couple of features I like to use in OpenOffice.org and Bluefish are the the increase/decrease indent buttons. Unfortunately in TextMaker you have to highlight the text or list that you want to indent and then use the change paragraph formatting button on the task strip, which is a bit of a rigamarole. When you click the change paragraph formatting button (right next to the big F button) a neat little window pops up that lets you change a whole range of other parameters, like fonts, spacing, superscripts, etc.

If you are used to using an HTML editor like Bluefish (what I use to write my stories) you will miss many of the features that just don't appear in TextMaker. Little things like the indent, font size, or HR buttons are buried in the TextMaker task strips drop-downs and menus. They are there, just a little hard to find for quick turnaround of lots of HTML. On the other hand, it doesn't proclaim to be a full-featured HTML editor. Definitely adequate for a simple content page.

TextMaker has chosen to put its help in an Adobe Acrobat .pdf file. While this may sound like a good idea, I really don't care for it much because it's just one more thing to open and wait for. It's a little strange that they would produce such a lightning fast word processor and then saddle the help with Acrobat. Incidently, the CD arrived without any books, either. And it was difficult to find topics of interest, because the .pdf help document didn't have a table of contents. I would have put the help in the program the way everyone else does.

Wrapping Up

TextMaker is a fast, full-featured word processor that seems reliable and stable. Editing MS Word documents is an easy and painless job, although I would like to see support for OpenOffice.org files. You can also produce some nice, basic HTML pages using the program. In spite of my short time with the program, I was very happy with its performance and could recommend it as a suitable addition to any business office list of computer tools.

Rob Reilly (aka: "Dr. Torque") is a professional writer and senior technology consultant, whose work includes Linux, business systems integration, innovation training and occasional hot rodding excursions. He frequently writes and speaks about these and other topics. He has 17 years experience in the high technology, manufacturing and the utilities industries. He is always 'on-the-lookout' for stories and projects that focus on Linux, business and the cutting edge.