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Writing Software

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boswellbaxter
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Writing Software

Post by boswellbaxter » Thu October 30th, 2008, 12:57 pm

Anyone here use any of the programs that assist with the mechanics of writing, e.g., keeping track of chapter numbers, allowing you to mark scenes to be filled in later, etc.? I've seen some of these that can be downloaded for a fee, others that are freeware, and I'm curious if anyone's tried them.
Susan Higginbotham
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Carla
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Post by Carla » Thu October 30th, 2008, 3:07 pm

[quote=""boswellbaxter""]Anyone here use any of the programs that assist with the mechanics of writing, e.g., keeping track of chapter numbers, allowing you to mark scenes to be filled in later, etc.? I've seen some of these that can be downloaded for a fee, others that are freeware, and I'm curious if anyone's tried them.[/quote]

No, never felt the need to. I find Word does everything I need. I number chapters manually and don't find it hard to keep them in sequence when I edit, and if I need to mark a scene to be filled in later I just put a note in double square brackets and bold text, e.g. [[Human sacrifice scene here]], or [[check name of fort]]. The bold stands out if I'm reading through, and the [[ is easily found with the search function.
PATHS OF EXILE - love, war, honour and betrayal in Anglo-Saxon Northumbria
Editor's Choice, Historical Novels Review, August 2009
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Rowan
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Interest in HF: I love history, but it's boring in school. Historical fiction brings it alive for me.
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Post by Rowan » Thu October 30th, 2008, 4:25 pm

I too have only used MS Word for any writing I've done in the past, though at home I have Open Office installed on my computer. It functions exactly like MS Office, with all the various programs (like Excel and Access and Powerpoint) but with different names and it's free. When I was editing a few years ago, I got into the habit of saving all of my wordprocessing documents as .rtf (Rich Text Format) for compatibility purposes. If I get back into writing full form again, I think I will swipe Carla's idea about the double square brackets and bold text. :D ;) :p

I think a lot of that writing software is really aimed at the new writer who wants to make sure they have all the right tools when embarking on their careers and they wind up spending money unnecessarily.

Carla
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Post by Carla » Thu October 30th, 2008, 4:42 pm

Feel free to pinch the idea, Rowan. It's stood me in good stead in my professional capacity for the best part of 20 years :-)
PATHS OF EXILE - love, war, honour and betrayal in Anglo-Saxon Northumbria
Editor's Choice, Historical Novels Review, August 2009
Now available as e-book on Amazon Kindleand in Kindle, Epub (Nook, Sony Reader), Palm and other formats on Smashwords
Website: http://www.carlanayland.org
Blog: http://carlanayland.blogspot.com

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EC2
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Post by EC2 » Thu October 30th, 2008, 6:11 pm

[quote=""Carla""]No, never felt the need to. I find Word does everything I need. I number chapters manually and don't find it hard to keep them in sequence when I edit, and if I need to mark a scene to be filled in later I just put a note in double square brackets and bold text, e.g. [[Human sacrifice scene here]], or [[check name of fort]]. The bold stands out if I'm reading through, and the [[ is easily found with the search function.[/quote]

Carla, that's more or less what I do, except in my case I change colour onscreen so that the bit to checked or written later is in red bold so it stands out when I scroll through.
Les proz e les vassals
Souvent entre piez de chevals
Kar ja li coard n’I chasront

'The Brave and the valiant
Are always to be found between the hooves of horses
For never will cowards fall down there.'

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Divia
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Post by Divia » Thu October 30th, 2008, 11:27 pm

Yeah I never bought any writing software either. Never saw the need, cause I think word does it for me. And I put my words in blue so I know what needs to be change, added or sometimes I say What? does this even make sense blah blah blah...
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Hoopking
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Post by Hoopking » Fri November 7th, 2008, 7:22 pm

I use MS Word and Acrobat Pro for PDF conversion, thats it.

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Hunter
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Post by Hunter » Fri November 7th, 2008, 7:51 pm

I write in C while sitting in my office--- Oh. Writing software, not writing software.... ;)

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