How do people use Wordpad for coding? I’ve never seen that done. If I ever open code in an editor with a “bold” button, I screwed up and close without saving.
Idea! A programming language where text formatting has syntactic meaning! Variable declarations must be italicized! Function calls underlined! And every line justified, of course.
Not everyone has the money for a copy of Word. There once was a time when free rich text editors were valuable. But at this point I agree it isn’t needed anymore. There are plenty of FOSS alternatives to word that hit that market. Microsoft has probably kept it around this long to prevent people from looking, but now they’ve put their bet on cloud services.
ScintillaTE is an old-ass one. Most people have never heard of it, and those that have have only heard of its variant, UniSciTE, which came bundled as the default text editor for Unity, something like 15 years ago.
Assuming you are talking about OpenOffice and LibreOffice, there’s also CollaboraOffice (although this may be counted as another half one, since it’s a online fork of LO) and OnlyOffice in the FOSS sphere. Probably more out there I’m not aware off.
I probably haven’t thought if it for like 10 years myself but this post reminded me of it. I remember maybe 15 years ago using a portable version of it on a USB drive, and it was amazing.
Except it will nuke .docx formatting. Same in reverse.
I make templates for my clients and I always tell them not to open and save in any other client other than OpenOffice.
Even Libre does nuke some parts to some extend…
Every time I open anything open office in Word everything is scattered as is usally with the Word meme when moving a picture 2mm.
Libre aint much better. Also I prefer the OpenOffice design. Libre might be more modern and that’s usually what I prefer but I feel like OO is more efficient with it’s menu.
Can’t beat the menu ribbon from Word/Office though.
No as my work is using open office and Ihad some issues creating them with libre and then using it in OO.
Outaide of that we have M365 and have no need to go Libre as I can’t see me spending time to relearn it at work.
Sounds good though. If I am ever switching to FOSS in that department, I am willing to take a look.
I really like the form options and export to pdf of OO/Libre.
You’re assuming everyone is a power user. There will be thousands of people who won’t have an alternative and think that paying for word is the only option.
This is to fuck over the casual computer user who doesn’t know better or alternatives. Microsoft already knows that more informed users like us are a lost cause to upsell.
This is also why they tried that “malware” pop up to get people to go back to Edge. To once again, fuck over uninformed users.
Honestly I’m not too bummed, especially with open-source solutions like Notepad++, but it’s the end of an era! Also, Word is paid, and so Windows not having a built in free RTF editor is notable
Windows not having a built in free RTF editor is notable
Yeah, that is a bit odd, but then again when’s the last time you’ve seen something other than a cut-rate eBook in RTF? Everything is either some variant of plain text or a DOC file these days.
Plus, it’s rare that you ever need to edit RTF files. Read, sure, but that could be handled by Word Viewer, which is free.
EDIT: Right, they’re discontinuing the viewers, but apparently they have a cloud-based online thing that’s free? Sucks if you live somewhere with crap internet I guess.
RTF is a rarity these days since basically every phone, tablet, and other handheld device can handle either PDFs or HTML (and ePub is basically just a ZIP file with HTML in a specific naming scheme and structure). Back in the day though you’d find RTFs more often for use in budget/jury-rigged eReader options. It’s much easier to parse, if nothing else.
It’s nowhere near as bloated as Word but you have many more options than Notepad when it comes to formatting and presentation. It’s actually impressive how much you can do within the limits of RTF.
I love Clippy. It's cool that he can answer all kinds of questions and stuff like that, but I only got him to be a little desktop companion. I wish he had a little more personality to him. His jokes are dry and he's always saying that he's my Windows assistant. His "conversations" can be cute at times, I just wish he wasn't so relentless in his pursuit to assist. I don't really need help from Clippy, I never did. I need Clippy's companionship.
N.B. Notepad3 (originally Flo’s notepad2) is a great drop-in replacement for notepad.exe (and even has an install option to do exactly that, so everything opens with it even if other programs call it). I install it on every Win system I have to manage. Not as big as Notepad++, but has syntax highlighting, line numbers and supports LF file endings.
EDIT: Disappointingly no screenshots on either site >:| It looks similar to vanilla notepad.exe
This is very upsetting to me–more as a point of principle than in fact–but I appreciate that it doesn’t bother younger generations at all. I just had a small argument with my 11 year old about how not-a-big-deal-who-cares this is, and it basically ended with us agreeing to disagree since it’ll be his problem and his kids’ problem.
And the problem is normalizing the notion that an OS doesn’t need to include a non-subscription word processor. The entire point of this move is to shift the OS Overton Window in favor of consumers accepting and expecting that features like word processors, spreadsheets, etc., should be installed separately and paid for on a subscription basis despite previous iterations of the same software being feature complete on install and purchased at a set, non-recurring fee.
WordPad hasn’t been anybody’s first choice for a word processor in years, but it was included with Windows and did the bare minimum for unsophisticated users. Now we’re entering an era in which those users will as a matter of course buy off-the-shelf computers that come pre-installed without WordPad, but rather with a trial of Office Fuck-You-Pay-Me Edition. Those users may well discover that after their first six months with their new computer (that has made Microsoft more money selling their data than they paid for it), they suddenly get a pop-up informing them that their trial is up and MS wants $99.99 to release the documents they’re holding hostage.
It’s a step backwards for consumers in general, so even for the sophisticated of us who are least likely to be personally affected by this change, there’s definitely cause for alarm.
piracy theme intensifies
Office is one of the easiest things to pirate. It 1. is very popular 2. has an official mass-activation way that can be easily exploited. I suspect we may have a spy in there
Or, y'know, just use LibreOffice with the tabs setting and contextual groups if you can afford experimental features
or if you still hate the UI just use WPS instead, who cares that it's awful and from China you don't have to pay
Also, why would you even get Word or PowerPoint on macOS?? Excel I understand but these two??
Let me clarify what I meant. I am saying that we pay for the OS which includes applications on both Mac and Windows. Only Mac gives us a free suite of office applications.
The cost of the full Mac apps and OS is in the cost of the hardware. At least it’s one upfront cost. Surely the way windows is going can’t be popular or sustainable.
I’d like to normalize the notion that an OS shouldn’t include any application software except for a browser you can use to install other things. Let people pick what they want to use and install it themselves.
Wasn’t there an anti trust or monopoly suite against Microsoft for bundled IE back in the day? Funny how times change, though I agree it’s not easy to get a preferred browser without one. Mean it never was overly simple but they were on so many CDs mailed out back then. Think it has to do with some IE and Windows integration too so not just cause they bundled it.
The problem with IE4 is that it was designed in such a way that it was deeply integrated into the operating system, such that it could not be uninstalled.
It's completely reasonable now to ship an operating system without a browser, as long as there's some kind of "app store" or "package manager" through which a user can install whatever browser they want (provided it's available through said store, of course).
Better yet, the OS should just include a desktop environment with simple utilities and a package manager to install the applications you want. It will make users less likely to run into malware while searching for the programs in the web
I was talking more in the lines of taking away most of the windows bloat. If someone wants to install their own desktop environment they will most likely go down the linux path.
We’re talking about Windows here, where the desktop environment is too thoroughly intertwined with the rest of the OS to ever remove it. The kind of terminal emulator environment that Linux boots into doesn’t even exist in versions of Windows that have been sold after the early 2000s.
I think a file manager, text editor and command prompt are pretty essential too. And when you’ve added those, where exactly is the limit where it becomes “application software”?
I think it’s worth separating the two related but distinct concepts of what is a part of the operating system itself (for example, the actual file manager) and what is pre-installed or bundled with the operating system (games like Minesweeper).
I agree with you that a rich text editor definitely shouldn’t be part of the OS. But should it be a bundled part that ships with the desktop environment, the way Windows/MacOS/Android/iOS/ChromeOS all come with photo library software, basic image editors, media players, browser, email client, etc.? These applications aren’t strictly necessary to use or maintain the system itself, so maybe they shouldn’t have some kind of privileged use of the OS’s functionality, but there’s no harm in bundling in the installation defaults.
I don’t think a rich text editor is an important enough function to necessarily be preinstalled with the OS, but I can see an argument, at least. There’s a reason why Windows shipped with one since the beginning, and why MacOS and KDE and Gnome each have a default that very few people actually use regularly.
Tbh I use Notepad way more than anything for note making.
If it needs to be formatted, OneNote is free to use and can be saved in any cloud (if there is a shortcut like OneDrive or Dropbox in the Windows explorer)
If it needs to be free and not very sophisticated, I’d look around for a markdown based editor.
If all of that fails, I will use Word.
Never used Wordpad in 15 years (of 24 years of existence) except while trying to open word but Windows suggesting Wordpad first.
i use wordpad a lot for viewing docs (loads faster, uncluttered ui). occasionally writing them... and more than once instead of notepad for a text file (on a system without a notepad alternative available) because i needed more features.
i have a few clients that use wordpad as their 'word processor', lack of spelling check be damned.
microsoft must have run out of excuses for specifically not including one in it, seeing how recent windows has spell check baked-in to the os itself. so instead of losing a few dozen sales of office home and student or 365 by making wordpad just a little bit better for those who use it, they're gonna be the assholes and take it out completely and push everyone to the damn cloud app or a 365 sub. fk 'em.
It has it’s uses. Not for me but some are definitely need it. Problem is, how much effort is it to keep it around vs how much is it used realistically.
Best way forward would be to replace it with a completely different app like Word online but as an actual app lile Word Lite or something like that.
I get where you're coming from but I think you're overstating the impact in this day and age. If this had been 1995 it'd be a big deal. Now it's rediculously easy to install any alternative you like for free.
Libre Office is an entire free fully features office suite.
I'm less bothered about removing WordPad than I am about Microsoft advertising and pre-installing it's products in Windows - they force Edge on people, they push OneDrive and preinstall a preview of Office. That's the real problem - not losing WordPad.
At one point Anti-Trust / Anti-monopoly regulators globally punished Microsoft for pushing Internet Explorer to consumers and for a long time in Europe had to offer a choice of Browsers to download on new Windows installs. Now it's allowed to get away with abusing it's dominant position to force it's products on consumers.
Does liber office make .docx files and export to pdf?
It does. It’s fine as a replacement for Word, but no one has an answer for Excel. LibreOffice Calc is fine for a basic spreadsheet, but Excel is in a completely different universe than Calc with anything beyond that.
To be fair though, Excel is in a completely different universe than literally any other competing product.
Sheets is capable enough for the average person but a business is always going to want to use Excel because it’s the industry standard.
I can’t remember the last time I actually needed a spreadsheet for anything other than looking at a bunch of tabular data, but I’m a programmer so I’m not the standard spreadsheet user.
JSON files that get committed to a git repo, obviously. They’re in a private repository in GitHub so that takes care of security and resiliency, two birds with one stone.
Nothing compares to excel. There are spreadsheets, and there is excel. The world runs on excel, and for a damn good reason. Also, excel runs the world, literally.
They don’t. Libre Office is maintained by a non-profit called The Document Foundation. They’re funded entirely by donations. I think they make enough to have some full time employees.
A lot of open source software is created by individuals or non-profits. The Mozilla foundation makes Firefox, for instance. They make money through donations and also Google pays them a ton of money to be the default search engine.
There are for profit companies that make or contribute to open source software. Such as Red Hat. They tend to make money by selling support for the software.
A web browser is not a word processor no matter how much they tart it up. If the thing isn’t saving a file to my local drive that is in a common format It’s not worth putting your effort into.
So many kids are going to grow up not having the concept where data lives and what the failure modes are.
Likely scenario, honestly. I really don’t worry about it, though. Not to brag, but it doesn’t bother me. Understand, there is a solution. X marks the spot.
(Yeah, I know, that’s kind of stupid. But it seemed funny in my head.)
I used it for my damn resume because I didn’t have word, didn’t need office. I also liked it because when friends asked me to review a document I could open word documents with it, I would do that sometimes even when I had office because WordPad opened faster and I didn’t need perfect formatting.
I think it is safe to say that your 11 year old is factually wrong lol. But it is okay that they don’t understand how bad this is because the concept of how multiple businesses have switched to subscription based models even in places we wouldn’t expect, like a monthly subscription allowing already installed hardware in your car to actually function, cause it’s just 11 year Olds don’t have a great concept of bills and money at that level yet. I say wait for their first complaint of it as an adult and then put on your carefully choreographed and practiced “I told you so” dance
Okay kidding aside I think it is absolutely wonderful this is something you didn’t just have a conversation with your young kid about but that you had to agree to disagree, you sound like a fantastic parent who actually fosters a relationship with their kid. And probably only rarely says I told you so.
I disagree. I don’t think a rich text editor should be part of the OS as it’s not there to operate the computer. An OS should be the tools to run applications and manage your computer. There are a bunch of apps which are so small that it makes sense to include them - like a calculator and text editor, but everything else should be optional.
There should be an OS out there for you which doesn’t come with a rich text editor. [If there is ever a time to mention GNU+Linux in a MS thread then now is that time.] For most people however, not including it is a needless barrier to entry.
Google Docs is free and has basically become the standard word processor for the “unsophisticated users” you’re worried about. It essentially comes with your OS because you only need a browser to use it.
Making things in Google Docs is fine, but last I checked Google Docs just sucked at opening anything that wasn’t already a GDoc. LibreOffice Writer sometimes has formatting errors opening Word Docs, but it does a miles better job than Google Docs.
Also, I hate how normalized everything using the cloud (aka “Someone Else’s Hard Drive”) for no reason is.
Well to be fair to Google (urgh, that hurt to write) that’s by design, and LO doing so well at it is due to investing a lot of engineering time on it. Basically MS released an open standard for office documents, but refuses to use this open standard themselves, and instead keeps using an ever evolving “transitional” version of their standard that isn’t made public.
it still has strings attached, its not truly “free”. heck, google won’t let it be word pad had no ties to Microsoft once it was given to you. everything else but LibreOffice and some others still have its creator’s ties.
It’s too bad Linux isn’t more normalized. For those very simple users (and for the more sophisticated) Linux is probably much better than Windows at this point.
No ads, free software, updates can be very simple and stable, less security issues.
Because libre office is not compatible with many others. You can open it sure but there’s no guarantee that opening .doc or .docx will have broken formatting. Not good for those in the academia or workplace where formatting are strictly enforce.
Absolute bullshit. Microsoft moved to the Open Office document standard after they were forced to and Libre is renown for its ability to open Microsoft’s documents without issue. I have opened countless personally.
Do yourself a favour and get off the junk office suite that hasn’t received a functional update in the last 10 years that wasn’t to improve its rent charging capacity.
This is very upsetting to me–more as a point of principle than in fact–but I appreciate that it doesn’t bother younger generations at all.
I am in a support group with over 100 senior citizens in it. Getting a file with a *.rtf extension used to be a thing, but it hasn’t been a thing in years. I do get *.doc and *.docx files so they’re probably getting lured into Office like you said even before Wordpad is removed.
I can see truth to either position presented in these comments, but I don’t like being a fence sitter. That being said, I would think making it available but not mandatory would satisfy both opinions, right? Making it unavailable altogether is a move that seems to have an ulterior motive.
Not trying to defend Microsoft, but making it available to the fraction of a fraction that would actually download it is probably not worth it because you still would have to maintain it, making sure it’s compatible with new windows versions and providing security updates.
It’s a lot easier to just kill it outright, and those that do actually really really want it can find some third party who has uploaded a version of the exe file somewhere.
I agree with the first half of your statement completely, but as for killing it outright I would think turning it over to FOSS developers would be a less incendiary solution. As many people are saying, it hardly competes with other software that is already available.
I used WordPad so much growing up. I fucking HATED Word and the office applications as a kid, WordPad just worked and just did writing, which is what I wanted to do.
Notepad is just a barebones text editor. I doubt there were any substantial changes since Windows 95, other than ensuring it runs on a 32 and later 64 bit infrastructure, and the menu works with newer releases. That sounds like a 1h per quarter job at most.
Notepad is, in fact, under active development. They recently upgraded find and replace so it works 90% of the time instead of 30% and added some annoying restore session by default feature. not to mention tabs
I interviewed at Microsoft decades ago and found a bug in notepad during my interview when they gave me a laptop and asked me how I would test notepad.
Their faces indicated that this was not supposed to be a productive exercise.
I haven’t been using Wordpad for 20+ years. Notepad could do everything it does already. Then, you also have Firefox’s built-in inspect to tinker with code on the fly.
it will deprecate WordPad with a future Windows update as it’s no longer under active development
It doesn’t need “active development” because it is perfect the way it is. Unix/Linux has tons of useful programs that haven’t been in active development for 40-50 years.
This is my reaction even as a Windows user. In my experience, notepad is used when you just need to read what’s in the file and formatting and such doesn’t really matter, or you explicitly want as little processing of the data as possible. Like opening files that really aren’t text based files.
And then if you actually want formatting, images, fonts, etc to make something look good you get an actual document editor: Word, Libre Office, etc.
The only thing I see WordPad providing is it’s pre-installed and does have more functionality than notepad. I have used WordPad a couple of times when I’ve been on a new computer that doesn’t yet have everything installed and I don’t want to take the time to install an actual editor for whatever I’m doing. It’s pretty damn rare though.
Add comment