Linux for Newbies, pt. 19:
Word Processing in Linux, Part 1

by Gene Wilburn

(The Computer Paper, Feb 2001. Copyright © Wilburn Communications Ltd. All rights reserved)

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There are two branches of word processing associated with Linux. There's the modern kind--Windows and Macintoshy--fully featured, glossy, easy to use, and offering varying degrees of compatibility with MS Word. Some of these Linux word processors are proprietary and some are open source. They're the GUI-based, mouse-driven programs that most people think define the category of "word processing".

Then there's the other kind--products from an older tradition that might best be called "document processing". One of the original uses for Unix was technical documentation. Because of this, Unix has acquired a deep treasure chest of tools for creating and producing complex documents such as reports, theses and books. Linux has inherited a rich set of these packages.

In this installment, we'll look at four of the slick X-based word processors that have emerged onto the Linux scene in the past two or three years. If you already use a word processor on another operating system, these packages will undoubtedly feel comfortable and intuitive. In Part 2, we'll delve into markup languages and their components: such as TeX, LaTeX, LyX and SGML/XML-based DocBook.

WordPerfect 8 for Linux

Office suites have become popular, but if you're content with a commercial-grade stand-alone word processor, WordPerfect 8 for Linux is a fine choice. It feels right. Performance is nimble, and the feature list is extensive, including a nice supply of WordPerfect printer drivers. And, of course, WordPerfect retains its beloved "Reveal Codes."

There are drawbacks, however. The "personal" version of WordPerfect 8, available free as a download, has a few features disabled. Corel offers a relatively inexpensive "pay-for" version with all the features intact. Compatibility with Microsoft Word, up to Word 6, is passable, but far from perfect. WordPerfect printer drivers are not usable by other Linux applications.

WordPerfect 8 for Linux was released about two years ago, a lifetime in Linux terms. Because it was compiled against the then-prevalent libc5 packages, it doesn't always install well against the libc6 libraries of current Linux distributions. To use WordPerfect, you need to install retro libc5 libraries for backward compatibility. Nonetheless, it's a solid, proven product. You can download WP8 at http://linux.corel.com/products/wp8/download.htm.

Corel offers a more recent version--WordPerfect 9--in its new Corel Office 2000 suite. WP9 is an entirely different product, based in part on cross-platform WINE libraries created to work in both Linux and Windows. Unfortunately WordPerfect9 is sluggish even with a very up-to-date processor and WP9 is not available as a trial download. There is also a cloud over Corel's direction with Linux. It is not known, at the time of this writing, if the company will continue its Linux initiatives. For now, stick with version 8.

Star Office 5.2

The Star Office suite has been around for a few years and was available as a free download long before Sun Microsystems purchased the German-based product. Sun now offers it for free for both Linux and Windows and there is a Mac version on the way. Sun is in the process of open-sourcing the code and the name will probably be changed to OpenOffice. Star Office is a major component of Sun's strategy to gain a foothold in the MS Office empire.

Sun is in a position to give Microsoft a bit of competition with this product. Functionally it's the rough equivalent of MS Office 2000 Premium. Both suites offer a database component: MS Office includes Access and Star Office includes Adabas D.

The word processing module is modern and frames based, making it a candidate for low-end desktop publishing as well as office word processing. It exports to HTML, Word, RTF and other formats. Importing MS Word documents, including Word97 and Word2000, is generally good, though not perfect. MS Word tables break up a bit on import. Sun promises better and better MS compatibility with each release.

The chief downside of Star Office is its sheer size. It requires extensive resources to run and is slow to load. For Linux at least, printer support is limited to Postscript printers. Font support is limited to Type 1 fonts. These are not serious drawbacks if you have Postscript equipment, but it circumscribes the product's general appeal for Linux users. There should be TrueType font support in the near future once XFree86 v4 for Linux becomes widespread.

If you have a speedy processor and plenty of RAM, the product has a good look and feel and is well worth downloading to try out. Check it out at the Sun site: http://www.sun.com.

AbiWord

Moving from the commercial world into the world of open source, we arrive first at the AbiSource Project. The goal of AbiSource is to create a suite of free desktop productivity applications. Its first product is AbiWord Personal. AbiWord is a work in progress, reaching only version 0.7.11 at the time of this writing. It is very lightweight but has all the features most people need in a word processor. The look and feel remind me of MS Word around Word 2.0.

AbiWord employs an innovative approach to file storage. Its native file format is XML, rather than the typical binary formats used by products such as WordPerfect, Word and Star Office. This use of an open standard prevents AbiWord file formats from going out of date in a few years.

It also exports to RTF, HTML and LaTeX. The LaTeX export is highly interesting, as we'll see next month. It can also export to PDB, the Palm Pilot format, allowing AbiWord documents saved as PDB to be imported directly into Palm devices. AbiWord imports RTF and Word97 documents.

The feature list is short, solid and growing: character formatting, paragraph alignment, spellcheck, interactive rulers and tabs, styles, unlimited undo/redo, multiple column control, widow/orphan control, find/replace and images.

For a product that hasn't yet reached version 1.0, AbiWord is impressive. It loads and saves files quickly and it performs well. You can check out AbiWord at www.abisource.com. It is included as part of many Linux distributions. Take it for a test drive. It may be the one you're looking for.

KWord

One of the ambitious side goals of the KDE Project is to create a complete open-source office suite with parts that communicate with each other. Called KOffice, it has been released as an optional part of the release of KDE2.

KWord is the word processor of the KOffice suite and visually it's a stunner. You can see at first glance that the product is a labour of love, with attention paid to small details.

KWord is feature rich and frames-based, giving it a somewhat FrameMaker feel. It is designed to be used for desktop publishing as well as word processing.

KWord exhibits a lot of "newness". File loading and saving are slow. Export to HTML is broken in the release I tested: it only emitted a header. If you highlight material onscreen, the DEL key doesn't delete it, making it non-standard in terms of industry-accepted keystrokes.

Nonetheless it's a lovely product that is going to improve with each iteration. For now, I'd mark it as experimental and not trust anything too important to it until it establishes a clean track record. You can find out the full story on KWord at www.koffice.org.

Word Processing: An Alternative View

Linux is a quixotic mix of new and old. The four products examined in this installment are relatively new: they make full use of the graphical user interface and mouse support to deploy WYSIWYG word processing applications of the type many users would consider mainstream.

Aside from ease of use, however, these products essentially deliver end results that were already available in Unix thirty years ago, and they frequently don't do as good a job of it. There are many Unix and Linux veterans who eschew word processors altogether in favour of plain-text typesetting and documentation tools.

The underlying reason for this entrenched resistance is philosophy: plain text is open--it can be manipulated in countless ways; binary files are closed--they are inaccessible to the user except through the product that created them. Unix has traditionally been a programmer's haven. Plain text is open to direct programming. Binary files, such as Word, WordPerfect, StarOffice and KWord files are not.

Then there is the issue of tools. For many vets vi and emacs are extensions of the mind in the way that high-quality hand tools are part of a master cabinet maker's spiritual makeup. Why switch editing tools just to process some words?

Next month's column is about classic Unix "document processing". We'll examine products that allow you to use your favourite text editor to create files that can produce results you might have thought possible only by using a high-end desktop publishing program such as FrameMaker or PageMaker. And we'll see how text-based documents such as SGML and XML, have come full circle to be, once again, at the leading edge of technology.

"Everything old is new again." Stay tuned.

Gene Wilburn (gene@wilburn.ca) is a Toronto-based IT specialist, musician and writer who operates a small farm of Linux servers.

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