Posts Tagged ‘Stylewriter’
Software for writing
Software for writing? Are you nuts?
Most of the software-making world believes that the only way to lure users to give up conventional way of doing things and switch to digital is to give them not only what they do today, but also a little more. This ‘more’ usually acts as the triggering factor for taking out the credit card.
Unfortunately, when it comes to writing world, this trick is not such a good idea (hark! hark! programmers…) What does one need to write? A blank paper and something which can make marks on it. If your software can provide this, it is good enuff for 90% writers. The software which do more are the ones that irritate the hell out of most writers (”It dictates what should be my storyline…”)
Now when i say writer, don’t conjure up the image of Rushdie and Dan Brown alone. These are the blokes who would perhaps want plain vanilla word processors and may be, just may be, ask their assistant to type while they dictate… People who write mundane stuff like your weekly magazine’s articles, tech. journals, tech writers, content publishers, journalists, screenplay writers, script-writers, ghost-writers… well they are writers, too. And some of them are definitely going to be happy if there are software available to help them write up that article quickly and more coherently. It is mainly this genre which is likely to buy a writer’s software. This is also because these people need to churn out a higher turnover of written, publishable material over unit time… (Rushdie can get away with 40K words every 2 years, but these buggers need to churn out 10k words a week to put bread on their table, you see…) So they need tools for productivity… not necessarily “writing tools”; if you know what i mean.
In this article, I am going to do two things. One, I’ll try to list out what are the features that are usually available in these writing software. Two i am going to review some well established and easily available writing tools and make you aware which all features they support.
It is important to understand that no single software can be labelled as best because all writers have different needs from the software. There are Writers who write outlines, characters, timing before hand. Others plan as the novel goes by. Article writers need to keep certain points in mind that they need to necessarily cover while others have word limits and so on. You will gain most from this article if you know your own writing style. Then just find the software which suits you.
Let’s begin with seeing what all features are commonly available in writing software:
Features to watch out
- Type text
- Format text
- Spell check
- Style check
- Language prompt
- outline formation
- character building
- location/division into chapters
- scene creator
- chronological order and time line
- Various views (thread based view, timeline, storyline, etc)
- quick re-ordering of scenes into chapters or sections
- index card maker
- Age tracker
- image insertion/ graph insertion/ etc
- Advanced statistical features like (Average sentences per paragraph, Average words per sentence, Average characters per word, Average words per page, Flesch-Reading Ease, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, Automated Readability Index etc.)
- More advanced features like oft repeated words, oft repeated phrases, etc
Now let us consider some of the established software. I will give MY opinion about them. Don’t go by my opinion simply because it need not be your opinion too. This is because you may be a different kind of writer. So just read the features and make up your own mind. (An alternative good blog post can be read here )
I am gonna write one blog post for each of these software. Naturally this will be a work in progress for some time. The one’s which have clickable links are the ones that i have reviewed ( You can click on the software and read its review) while the ones without the links are yet to be reviewed. NOTE: Since I am already in possession of all these software already, you may ask me to review a particular one out-of-turn in case you are dying to know more about it. Moreover, if there is a tool that is not covered here, you are welcome to either send me its review or send me its name and I’ll review it.
- Page Four
- yWriter 5.0
- Liquid Story Binder XE by Black Obelisk Software
- Celtx
- StorYbook.intertec.ch
- Writeway
- New novelist
- Final draft
- Rough draft
- Hollywood Screenplay
- MS word/OOO/word perfect
- Wordpad/notepad/notepad++
- Frontpage
- OneNote
- Business Plan maker pro
- Storyline writer’s cafe
- Stylewriter
- Latex
- Evernote
- Writer’s Blocks www.writersblocks.com
- Google docs
- Hollywood screenplay
- Dramatica pro
- Freemind
- LM 2000
- Http://www.autocrit.com/index.cfm
Lastly, how do i plan to rate/review the software?
What you will find for each software is:
- Name
- GF Index Score (Gut-feeling Index score… given 1 thru 10 higher being good)
- Feature Score (More the Features, higher the score) (You may like to select lower scored software if u want plain software)
- Remarks
This is as subjective or as objective as i can get.
Tags: Automated Readability Index, Average characters per word, Average sentences per paragraph, Average words per page, Average words per sentence, Business Plan maker pro, Celtx, Dramatica pro, Evernote, features in writing software, Final draft, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, Flesch-Reading Ease, Freemind, Frontpage, Google docs, Hollywood Screenplay, Latex, Liquid Story Binder XE by Black Obelisk Software, LM 2000, MS word/OOO/word perfect, New novelist, OneNote, Pagefour, Rough draft, software, software for writers, StorYbook.intertec.ch, Storyline writer's cafe, Stylewriter, Wordpad/notepad/notepad++, Writer's Blocks www.writersblocks.com, Writeway, writing software, yWriter (simon haynes)