My favorite Word Processor
In my line of work I use a lot of highly complex and complicated programs. I use everything from Photoshop to Dreamweaver to FinalCut Pro to FileMaker. I love powerful programs, but there is one area in which I have very basic needs - word processing.
In my line of work I use a lot of highly complex and complicated programs. I use everything from Photoshop to Dreamweaver to FinalCut Pro to FileMaker. I love powerful programs, but there is one area in which I have very basic needs - word processing.
I don't do a lot of word processing and I don't have any need at all for the power features of Word or Pages. Pages in particular is great program if you need to create complex documents, your companies next sales flyer or your club's monthly newsletter. But my needs are more simple than that. I create proposals for clients and occasionally still have to fire off a letter via snail mail.
Since Word and Pages are full fledged word processing applications and to some extent page layout programs, the launch speed of both apps is fairly slow. Pages takes about 20 seconds to go from a cold start to the open dialog box which isn't too bad. Word is even slower taking about 40 seconds to launch. If I happen to have a lot of apps running (which I always seem to have about 20 running at anyone time) and the available RAM is low the apps take even longer to launch. I want something that opens almost instantly and is easy to use once you have it open.
TextEdit (which comes installed on every Mac) is a good choice for fast opening, very basic word processor. It launches in about 1 second and can save a document as txt, rtf, doc, or even docx. However, the feature set on TextEdit swings in the other direction. TextEdit does have some cool features, especially for a freebie app that comes with you computer. But it doesn't have many text formatting tools. And when it comes to formatting text, it's not very easy to use. I'm not concerned with my proposals looking like they were produced by some high priced design firm, but I don't want it to look like I'm creating the document on my MacPlus either.
Now some of the Apple faithful are probably screaming - AppleWorks . . . APPLEWORKS . . . APPLEWORKS!! Back in the day AppleWorks was a great program. I created all my high school and college papers on Appleworks. It's a great word processor that's rock solid, fast and also does simple spreadsheets, databases and drawings. Here's a fact you probably didn't know - AppleWorks was also a Window's program. It's a great program that was obsolete even before development was discontinued in 2004. It officially reached EOL in 2007 so it makes no sense to use a program that someday in the near future probably won't even run on your Mac.
So about a year ago, I started looking for a word processor that fell somewhere in between TextEdit and Pages / Word. I tried out a bunch of different ones. There are a large number of word processors for the Mac with each one approaching things a little differently. Some of them were nice but none filled the niche I was looking for.
Then several months ago I came across Bean. Its a lightweight word processor that has all the features I use on a regular basis and none of the bulk of Word or Pages. It launches quickly ( about 2 secs), is simple to use and learn, and is rock solid. It also saves files in .rtf, .doc, and .docx formats so you can share documents easily with other people not using Bean. Best of all it's free...
I highly recommend you taking Bean out for a test drive. Pages is still the best full featured word processor out there and if you do heavy collaboration with people using Windows then your probably stuck with Word. But if you're like me and just need to bang out a document or two then Bean is probably your ticket.
http://www.bean-osx.com/Bean.html
I don't do a lot of word processing and I don't have any need at all for the power features of Word or Pages. Pages in particular is great program if you need to create complex documents, your companies next sales flyer or your club's monthly newsletter. But my needs are more simple than that. I create proposals for clients and occasionally still have to fire off a letter via snail mail.
Since Word and Pages are full fledged word processing applications and to some extent page layout programs, the launch speed of both apps is fairly slow. Pages takes about 20 seconds to go from a cold start to the open dialog box which isn't too bad. Word is even slower taking about 40 seconds to launch. If I happen to have a lot of apps running (which I always seem to have about 20 running at anyone time) and the available RAM is low the apps take even longer to launch. I want something that opens almost instantly and is easy to use once you have it open.
TextEdit (which comes installed on every Mac) is a good choice for fast opening, very basic word processor. It launches in about 1 second and can save a document as txt, rtf, doc, or even docx. However, the feature set on TextEdit swings in the other direction. TextEdit does have some cool features, especially for a freebie app that comes with you computer. But it doesn't have many text formatting tools. And when it comes to formatting text, it's not very easy to use. I'm not concerned with my proposals looking like they were produced by some high priced design firm, but I don't want it to look like I'm creating the document on my MacPlus either.
Now some of the Apple faithful are probably screaming - AppleWorks . . . APPLEWORKS . . . APPLEWORKS!! Back in the day AppleWorks was a great program. I created all my high school and college papers on Appleworks. It's a great word processor that's rock solid, fast and also does simple spreadsheets, databases and drawings. Here's a fact you probably didn't know - AppleWorks was also a Window's program. It's a great program that was obsolete even before development was discontinued in 2004. It officially reached EOL in 2007 so it makes no sense to use a program that someday in the near future probably won't even run on your Mac.
So about a year ago, I started looking for a word processor that fell somewhere in between TextEdit and Pages / Word. I tried out a bunch of different ones. There are a large number of word processors for the Mac with each one approaching things a little differently. Some of them were nice but none filled the niche I was looking for.
Then several months ago I came across Bean. Its a lightweight word processor that has all the features I use on a regular basis and none of the bulk of Word or Pages. It launches quickly ( about 2 secs), is simple to use and learn, and is rock solid. It also saves files in .rtf, .doc, and .docx formats so you can share documents easily with other people not using Bean. Best of all it's free...
I highly recommend you taking Bean out for a test drive. Pages is still the best full featured word processor out there and if you do heavy collaboration with people using Windows then your probably stuck with Word. But if you're like me and just need to bang out a document or two then Bean is probably your ticket.
http://www.bean-osx.com/Bean.html