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robdaemon

Posted Sat Aug 19, 2017 2:36 pm

intric8 wrote:This is going to take me some time, Rob. But I'll get on it today.
Absolutely no rush! I really appreciate it!

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Sat Aug 19, 2017 2:56 pm

I've needed to do this for a long time. I've created ADFs for each of the various disks for Word Perfect 4 (4.12) for Amiga. Links are here for you to download whatever you need. I may put this links elsewhere, too.

This really Does make me think I should eventually build a "Software" section, next to Games, so these can be more easily found in the future. Hm...

In any case, here they are: Word Perfect, on a HDD install, will want to modify your Startup Sequence and assign the disks there. It helps the program find the various disks later.

Enjoy! It's an awesome program IMO. No WYSIWYG per se, but very cool for writing and, if needed, moving back to a PC at some stage.

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BloodyCactus
Lexington VA

Posted Wed Apr 04, 2018 9:30 am

I know this is an old post, but wanted to throw in that I do remember WP4 on Amiga having some oddball bugs. It would seriously choke and crash on large files. I dont know about 4.12, but the early wp4 releases also had A1000 compatability issues. Mabye 4.12 fixed these and the large file issues too.

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dansalvato
Boise, ID

Posted Tue Aug 20, 2019 9:53 pm

I started experimenting with Amiga word processing on a whim. Although I like the readability of bitmap fonts, WordPerfect was missing the modern feel I've come to enjoy in word processors.

Since Final Writer 97 supports loading external fonts, I've been experimenting with finding nice pixel fonts and converting them to PostScript for use in Final Writer. So far the most readable font I've found is one called Coder's Crux, although I plan to keep looking.

Image

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dansalvato
Boise, ID

Posted Wed Aug 21, 2019 11:37 am

Here's an update: I managed to get hi-res interlaced mode to play nicely with my monitor, and the result is much cleaner and more readable - this is clearly the ideal resolution for the software. We've definitely entered the territory of highly usable for word processing.

My video capture device can't handle the screen mode, so here's an off-screen photo to demonstrate.

Image

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Aug 22, 2019 1:22 pm

I don't mean this to sound snarky, but with the naked eye how would you compare that text to the classic Macs (assuming you used them, or still do). They had an incredibly tight dot pitch when it came to text that made reading startlingly good.

I suppose that might depend the monitor that you might be using.

In my early tests with GUI-based Word Processors, I was only using OS 1.3 native resolutions, not interlaced modes. And I found it (just being honest) mediocre. When I went with bitmap fonts, though, it was (no torches, please) more like DOS. Very easy to read on the screen, especially when I could modify the screen colors to my preferences.

Your screen-cap above does look pretty good.

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rpiguy9907

Posted Fri Aug 23, 2019 6:39 am

Commodore's monitors were unusually large for 1985.

The 1080 was 14" when the normal screen size was 12" or 13". This was great for video, art, and games, but not great for DTP as the pixel's per inch were quite low, around 53ppi in Interlaced Hi-Res.

The Mac always had smaller than average screen sizes (until the Mac II and large format displays were introduced). The Mac Plus/SE, etc. were about 68ppi because the screen was small and therefore nice and sharp.

Long story short, if you want your Amiga to look as sharp as a Mac, plug it into a 12" Apple IIGS monitor. On that monitor Amiga Hi-Res is 62ppi and incredibly sharp :-)

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dansalvato
Boise, ID

Posted Fri Aug 23, 2019 12:40 pm

intric8 wrote:I don't mean this to sound snarky, but with the naked eye how would you compare that text to the classic Macs (assuming you used them, or still do). They had an incredibly tight dot pitch when it came to text that made reading startlingly good.
Sadly I haven't really used the classic Macs much, so I don't have a good basis for comparison. The other factor here is that I'm running the video signal through an OSSC upscaler and outputting it to a 24-inch LCD monitor. Blasphemy, I know. But aside from my preference for pixel-perfect video, I also do Amiga livestreams which requires that kind of digital setup.

I managed to capture the interlaced video so you can get an idea of how pristine it really looks. You would think this is captured from an emulator, but it is in fact captured from my real hardware - and this is the same picture that's going to my LCD.

Image

And here's Final Writer:

Image

At 720x480, these render quite small on modern monitors. To give you a better idea of what I see on my display, here is the capture scaled up to 1080p. It's possible to get a much crisper upscale (see this image), but I don't currently have the hardware to display this on my monitor for interlaced mode specifically.

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McTrinsic

Posted Fri Aug 23, 2019 1:09 pm

When using Final Writer 97 I guess RTG could be considered. At that year I would assume RTG to have been the target for serious word processing.

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dansalvato
Boise, ID

Posted Fri Aug 23, 2019 4:18 pm

I'm really taking a liking to excellence! more than Final Writer. Still feels very modern, but it's snappier, and most importantly it uses bitmap fonts rather than PostScript.

Image

The main disadvantage of excellence! is that it can't export to RTF - it seems you only get their proprietary format, and ASCII.

It would be a fun exercise to write a script that converts their doc format to RTF, though - I peeked at the doc file in a hex editor and it seems very doable! (At least for the basic formatting features.) I think I'm going to stick to excellence! for a while, and if I find myself committed to it then I'll revisit that idea.





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