Nicolas Alvarez wrote:

>> So, I figured out LaTeX and HTML (not to mention POV-Ray, the Lambda 
>> calculus, cryptography, inorganic chemistry, and much else besides) 
>> yet I couldn't figure out M$ Word?
>>
>> What does this say about M$ Word? ;-)
> 
> I definitely prefer writing in HTML than using any word processor (just 
> like I prefer SDL than a graphical modeller). I should learn DocBook.

I prefer writing in LaTeX, mainly due to the quality of the final 
output. On the downside, you really can't configure it very much. Here 
HTML is the way to go; lots of scope with CSS! But then, no maths...

I *could* prefer an editor like Word or OpenOffice, if only it would let 
me do structural markup rather than presentational...

> M$ Office is supposed to be intuitive, so people figure out how to use 
> it without reading the manual. Stupid idea in my opinion.

I agree.

Context help is all very nice and all, but for gaining a broad overview 
of how a feature is meant to work, nothing beats a logically structured 
manual.

> People 
> intuitively find the Center and Bold buttons, and that's how the Styles 
> feature goes unnoticed.

Arguably that's a issue of poor UI design choices. ;-) (I.e., the 
formatting buttons are big and bold in the middle of the display, and 
the styles are a tiny little thing in the corner that isn't even wide 
enough to display the whole text.)

> And then those same users trying to use POV-Ray 
> won't read the manual (because they aren't used to reading manuals) and 
> won't get too far :D

Well, no.

How many people ask where the wireframe view and the mesh editor is? ;-)

> I read Microsoft did a poll asking users what features they would like 
> for the next version. A *very* large amount of people asked features 
> that already exist. Microsoft figured the features were hard to find, 
> and that's how we get the new UI on Office 2007. Even if it's easier for 
> new users (which I doubt), everyone who already knew how to use Office 
> 2003 now has to re-learn everything.

Haha - M$ can then claim all these are "new" features, and everybody will go

   OMFG!!1!!eleven... micsoft is teh 0wnerz!

and think M$ are a really great company for producing all these cool new 
features. *sigh*

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