A rich office suite for Windows CE is on the way! [Archive]

Ed Hansberry

05-23-2002, 12:42 PM

<a href="http://www.softmaker.de/anywhere/anyce,en.htm">http://www.softmaker.de/anywhere/anyce,en.htm</a> SoftMaker Office is on the way, and they have a beta ready to go of their word processor called TextMaker. But don't get too excited yet. It only works on the Handheld PC, including the H/PC Pro and H/PC 2000 devices. Nothing for Pocket PC's. <img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/images/smiles/icon_sad.gif" /> <!> <img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/textmaker.gif" /> "Spell-checker? Graphics? Footnotes? No problem. Tables? Sophisticated character and paragraph formatting? Glossary? At your fingertips. The Windows CE version has almost all of the features the desktop version of TextMaker offers!" Here is a short version of the feature list: • Documents can be opened and saved in numerous formats • TextMaker for Windows, PocketWord, Word for Windows (not included in this beta version), RTF, ASCII, Unicode • Direct document exchange with the desktop version of TextMaker • no conversion required, no loss of formatting • Sophisticated table support • Outliner • All character and paragraph formatting capabilities you can expect from a high-end word processor • Spell-checker, hyphenation, and thesaurus available in many different languages (beta version includes German and English only) • Insert images in numerous formats (including BMP, JPG, GIF, PNG, and TIFF) and drawings (lines, rectangles, circles etc.) WOW! <img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/images/smiles/icon_eek.gif" /> Now that is a word processor. So, do you want this on your Pocket PC? Forget the full office suite for now, which I assume would include a powerful spreadsheet, presentation application and some sort of database. Just think about the word processor alone! How much would you pay for it? Please vote in the poll by selecting the comments link below and vote in the poll. Let's encourage SoftMaker to modify this to work on Pocket PC's! Thanks to Marc Zimmerman for the heads up. Attention Jeff Kirvin - you can only vote once! <img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif" />

Brad Adrian

05-23-2002, 12:52 PM

• Outliner?!?!?!?!?

That feature ALONE will make this worthwhile for a lot of users.

GadgetGuy

05-23-2002, 01:58 PM

The whole "Office Anywhere" concept described on SoftMaker's web site sounds great.

Is this German firm beating Microsoft to the .Net concept---with a more innovative execution?

On the PPC side, the attraction isn't just the full featured WP, which is very enticing by itself, but the potential integration and synchronization across devices and platforms.

I am eager to give this a whirl!

Jeff Kirvin

05-23-2002, 02:33 PM

How many times can I vote if I keep changing my IP address?

05-23-2002, 02:48 PM

I do a lot of note taking in the meetings using my E-125 and Stowaway keyboard so a full featured word processor for my Cassiopeia will be really nice. I've been waiting for a better word processor for a long time and I hope someone will come out with one soon.

Inaki C

05-23-2002, 02:54 PM

I think this is another mistake of how not to do software for handheld devices. Perhaps it is barely suitable for the handheld format (wide screen, keyboard) but it is not an acceptable concept for palm devices like Pocket PC, in my opinion.

Microsoft Research has developed some interesting concepts about that kind of office tools for palm sized devices, although these are still prototypes (they are working over Windows CE). I think these new concepts are going the right way.

A Pocket PC is not a laptop !
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JamesM

05-23-2002, 02:56 PM

Installing now on my H/PC. I'll let you know how it goes...
-James

JamesM

05-23-2002, 03:17 PM

But don't get too excited yet. It only works on the Handheld PC, including the H/PC Pro and H/PC 2000 devices.
Don't get too excited about the H/PC either. I tried to install, but got an error message that states, "Missing setup binary file Setup terminates..." I notified the company.

A Pocket PC is not a laptop !

Sorry, but for me it is. I do not carry a laptop anymore. I choose between my Jornada 568 and 680 depending on what I need to do on my trip.

- James

SoftMaker

05-23-2002, 04:12 PM

Don't get too excited about the H/PC either. I tried to install, but got an error message that states, "Missing setup binary file Setup terminates..." I notified the company.
We solved this problem by e-mail: Jim had another setup.exe from another app in the installation directory, and that messed up the installation.

To avoid collisions, we'll change the name of the setup.exe file to something else in the next beta.

Martin Kotulla
SoftMaker Software GmbH

JamesM

05-23-2002, 04:29 PM

Yep, my bad :oops: on the setup. Sorry.

OMG.

I just created a table, a header, and a footer on my handheld. I have wanted this for four years now of using handheld computers.

Yes, we all want this on Pocket PC.
- James

Ed Hansberry

05-23-2002, 05:11 PM

Cool! I like the way this is headed. $20 seems to be a no brainer and up to $40 has strong support. Great to see people willing to pay for compelling software!

And yes - my Pocket PC is my new laptop. I only take my laptop for trips longer than 4 days or work sessions where I need a full desktop to run Excel and Access.

Hugh Nano

05-23-2002, 06:26 PM

Wow! I would definitely be interested in this if it was available for the Pocket PC. I really miss tables in particular.

And, no, the Pocket PC is admittedly not a laptop. In many ways (instant-on, for example, and superior portability) it is better! (Especially if you add a Stowaway keyboard.) Now if only some of the software (especially MS's crippled Pocket Word) could be made just a little closer to what you can do on a laptop... (Integrated and easy (plug-n-play) printing support would also be nice!) A software package like this would help even the score a bit more!

WordCommands has helped immensely to supply some of the functionality I was missing--now if only they would make this sort of word-processing program available for the Pocket PC!

thadrool

05-23-2002, 06:32 PM

I'm just waiting patiently for the day something like this is released. When it is, I can guarantee you I will be first in line to get it. A full-featured word processor is long overdue for PPC and whoever comes up with one first will make a killing off of it.

dondiego

05-23-2002, 06:42 PM

Ed Hansberry

05-23-2002, 07:12 PM

its insanely slow on my ibm z50 - looks like too much owner draw - not that the z50 is a speed demon or anything

Just for reference, what is the free memory on the z50 before you launch it and what type and speed is the CPU? If it is one of those 75MHz MIPS chips I'm not too concerned. If it is a 200MHz StrongARM though....

SoftMaker

05-23-2002, 08:03 PM

its insanely slow on my ibm z50 - looks like too much owner draw - not that the z50 is a speed demon or anything

has anybody else tried it on a device like the z50 without a touch screen? I also lose the mouse cursor on all their owner draw controls. (And why are they ownerdrawing the menubar?)

OK, I got the whole arsenal of HPCs lined up in front of me. Here are the results:

Jornada 720 (StrongARM 206 MHz): ultra-smooth, very fast
Jornada 820 (StrongARM 190 MHz): just as nice
Compaq Aero 8000 (SH4 130 MHz): just as nice
LG Phenom (SH3 100 MHz): typing, scrolling, font changes a bit slower but still you cannot outtype the machine (and I'm a fast typer), dialogs and menus display noticeably slower than on the machines above
IBM Z50 (MIPS 130 MHz): typing is OK, scrolling is unacceptably slow, and so is dialog display.

This is very strange, and we'll have to investigate that.

Oh, yes indeed, beta 1 does not support a mouse cursor. This was an oversight on our part because we assumed that all WinCE machines had touchscreens. The first thing TextMaker does is turn off the mouse cursor. Oh well. We are busy adding touchpad support for beta 2.

And before you, Aero 8000 owners, rush to download the beta: Support for SH4 CPUs will be in beta 2, it's not in beta 1.

Martin Kotulla
SoftMaker Software GmbH

bsoft

05-23-2002, 11:09 PM

I have it working on my iPaq. Just extract the executable and related files with winzip and copy it to your Pocket PC.

bsoft

05-23-2002, 11:10 PM

Nyditot Virtual Display helps, too.

SoftMaker

05-23-2002, 11:38 PM

I have it working on my iPaq. Just extract the executable and related files with winzip and copy it to your Pocket PC.
Cool! Absolutely cool! I always knew it was a well-behaved WinCE application, but didn't really expect it to just work on Pocket PCs.

Of course, dialogs would have to be resized, menus rearranged etc. to make it a real port to Pocket PC.

So is this something that you want to have on a Pocket PC? How much word processing is actually being done on these machines? I cannot imagine creating documents by tapping on the on-screen keyboard, but how many people have add-on keyboards?

Any insights appreciated.

Martin Kotulla
SoftMaker Software GmbH

PS: for lurkers that want to try it: You cannot use the setup program because it checks the screen size of the attached machine. However, the downloadable tmc1.exe file is just a self-extracting ZIP file. You can simply unzip it and then copy the components to your Pocket PC. The setup program does nothing but copy stuff over to the HPC/PPC anyway.

PPS: The English-language resources are contained in the tmc.uwr file, German-language resources are in tmc.dwr (traditional German) and tmc.nwr (reformed German spelling). Copy only tmc.uwr, or else you'll be shown German dialogs (ACHTUNG!)

bsoft

05-23-2002, 11:46 PM

Works like a charm. Owner draw menus are a little sluggish, but that's OK. Still beats Pocket Word any day of the week. NVD helps a lot (dialogs and all fit proprely). Windows CE is a very versitile OS!

I do quite a bit of word processing on my iPaq. I have a Stoaway keyboard that I use. Pocket Word works most of the time but doesn't handle tables, etc. well.

A Pocket PC version would be extremely cool. You could reuse quite a bit of your code, so it wouldn't be too dificult. HPCs are great little machines but, unfortunately, aren't as common as Pocket PCs.

One suggustion: tone down all the owner-draw controls. Your program makes my iPaq look slow (but only when using the menus). The PocketPC version might be a challenge with screen real estate but it would certainly be nice!

Edit:
Anyone who's serious about doing work on their Pocket PC buys a fold-up keyboard. Even those who do not have a soft keyboard could benefit from this program as a word viewer. Viewing word documents with tables is a major feature for many people that Pocket Word just doesn't provide.

Also, the PocketPC version absolutely must support cleartype. Documents must be readable even with the limited resolution of Pocket PC devices. Landscape mode would also be an extremely useful feature.

SoftMaker

05-23-2002, 11:53 PM

Your program makes my iPaq look slow (but only when using the menus).
Can you help me confirm something?

Compare the speed of the following operations:
Open a menu and then click outside to make it go away
Open a dialog box and move it around to cover the control strips and then away from them.
Is the second operation significantly faster? It is on Handheld PCs because it seems that (for whatever reason) Windows CE is caching the area beneath dialog boxes but not beneath menus. That's an area where we might have to optimize the code.

Oh, and you can turn off the cutesy icons in the menus. Go to Extras/Preferences/General and turn off "Use icons in menus".

Martin Kotulla
SoftMaker Software GmbH

bsoft

05-23-2002, 11:57 PM

Yes, the 2nd operation is signifigantly faster.
Other than in menus the app isn't too slow. Maybe a little optimization but otherwise fine (the iPaq is a 206mhz Strongarm device, though, as are all Pocket PC 2002s)

Ed Hansberry

05-23-2002, 11:59 PM

So is this something that you want to have on a Pocket PC? How much word processing is actually being done on these machines? I cannot imagine creating documents by tapping on the on-screen keyboard, but how many people have add-on keyboards?

Any insights appreciated.
Are you kidding? :lol:

That is what this whole thread is about - this software on a Pocket PC! For several reasons.
• Be able to open true MS Word documents without the conversion allowing us to see tables, bullit lists in multiple levels, outlining etc.
• Create tables
• Outlining
• More formatting
• etc.

Pocket Word is more like Pocket Write. Check out the poll at the top - people are willing to fork out $20-$40 for this app alone on a Pocket PC. gimme gimme gimme. :wink:

And yes, many of us do have keyboards, but others use Transcriber or the keyboards to draft out memos and quick documents and want more powerful features than PocketWord offers.

Duncan

05-24-2002, 12:04 AM

So is this something that you want to have on a Pocket PC? How much word processing is actually being done on these machines? I cannot imagine creating documents by tapping on the on-screen keyboard, but how many people have add-on keyboards? Hmmm....post an e-mail asking that here, on Pocket PC Passion, on Brighthand, PocketNow etc. Then upgrade the bandwidth on your e-mail server by a factor of 100 and stand by for the avalanche.

Many, many of us use Pocket PCs as laptop surrogates - we buy folding keyboards, adjust to fast on-screen input methods etc. A decent Word Processor is what we have wanted for a very long time...

I'm guessing that using Nyditot to change screen resolution from 240x320 to 240x640 would probably work quite well as an interim measure...

Julio

05-24-2002, 12:07 AM

Personally, I use my Casio with a Stow-a-way keyboard quite often. Lugging around a laptop or notebook is oftentimes more of a hassle than bringing my PPC. So, for meetings, emails (when away from my desk), or general document-writing, I get a lot of use from my PPC. It is especially useful when I find myself with extra time away from my office (say, I travelled for a meeting and it was delayed) :) .

The most frustrating part of Pocket Word, however, is that it is TOO simple. :? I always need to revise any documents that I write on the PPC when I am back at my desk in order to insert styles such as headers, indented bullet points, etc. It is frustrating.

A more complete word processor on my little Casio PPC 2000 would be a blessing.

dondiego

05-24-2002, 12:14 AM

even if you aren't creating large documents with the pocketpc (i.e. you don't have a keyboard) there is always a need to be able to read documents.

the biggest problem i have with ms's current rtf/word support is no tables. 90% of the word docs I want to read on my device have tables, thats why I want your product!

(not to mention that there are far more pocketpc devices in the wild than hpc's so you'll expand the range of consumers who might want to buy your product dramatically)

IpaqMan2

05-24-2002, 12:31 AM

I have to admit that I was very disappointed by Microsofts Pocket word... more like Pocket notepad or pocket scratch pad. I as well have a stowaway and a snap and type and could use a real word processor, if MS Word can read the file when we port it over to our desktop files, than it would be worth even MORE!!!!!!!!!

Hope to see a real port of this on the PPC
:-)

Rob Alexander

05-24-2002, 03:46 AM

So is this something that you want to have on a Pocket PC? How much word processing is actually being done on these machines? I cannot imagine creating documents by tapping on the on-screen keyboard, but how many people have add-on keyboards?

Is this something I'd want? You bet, Martin! :D This is something that PPC users complain about constantly. Lots of us try to travel exclusively with our PPCs because lugging a laptop around the world is no fun at all.

I use my iPaq with a stowaway keyboard to take notes at conferences, view documents that I've created, develop new ideas, etc. I use it with a Voyager VGA card to give presentations at conferences and other universities. I use it with my mobile phone to check my email. I would rarely need a laptop, except that I have no decent word processor.

One of the main things I would look for would be the ability for a file to make a round trip to and from my PPC with everything intact. That is, if I could take a Word doument, open it on my PPC and make a few changes, then move it back to my desktop without losing all of my headers, tables, equations, etc., then I'd think I'd finally found the promised land. I don't even necessarily need to edit all of thoe things so long as it doesn't lose what it can't edit.

Pocket Word is nearly useless as anything more than a simple RTF note taker, but this product sounds great. If this were well-done and available for the PPC, I would definitely be a customer. If you want a market, my guess is that there are probably more PPC owners who would want this product than there are HPC owners in total. Given that the code already basically works on the PPC, the cost of porting the buttons and dialogs to the 240x320 format would easily be justified by the potential returns.

Jason Dunn

05-24-2002, 05:31 AM

Gosh, with a real word processor for the Pocket PC, maybe I could use it to write something... :-)

fishd1

05-24-2002, 12:19 PM

Awww... looks like our revenge was short lived... at the beginning of this thread I was thinking it was finally payback time... finally someone had released some cool software and it was only available on H/PC instead of it's upstart runt PocketPC :wink: ... I was thinking that finally all you PocketPC fanboys are left uttering the immortal words that us H/PC'ers live by.... "...but when is it available for my device???"

Damn you bsoft, you should have left them wanting for longer!!! :twisted: :wink:

Hugh Nano

05-24-2002, 01:09 PM

So is this something that you want to have on a Pocket PC? How much word processing is actually being done on these machines? I cannot imagine creating documents by tapping on the on-screen keyboard, but how many people have add-on keyboards?

YES! YES! YES! YES! YES!

There are many, many of us out there with Pocket PCs and Stowaway keyboards (or the new Compaq folding keyboard, or even GoType! keyboards) who use our Pocket PCs extensively, even exclusively for word-processing. And most of us have experienced considerable frustration with the limitations of Pocket Word and would be willing to pay $20-40 (preferably $20 :wink: ) for a full-featured, MS Word-compatible word-processor for our Pocket PCs.

I myself went out and bought a Pocket PC as soon as I heard of the Stowaway keyboard's existence, and use it almost exclusively for word-processing--sometimes even when I'm at home and my desktop PC is readily available! Software like this would be one step closer to a dream-come true! Please, for all of our sakes, port it to the Pocket PC!

Jeff Kirvin

05-24-2002, 03:03 PM

So is this something that you want to have on a Pocket PC? How much word processing is actually being done on these machines? I cannot imagine creating documents by tapping on the on-screen keyboard, but how many people have add-on keyboards?

I've been tirelessly campaigning for this for years. I'm a freelance writer, and I almost never write on a desktop or laptop PC. I've been writing on PDAs almost exclusively since 1997. I've got three Stowaway keyboards (for the Jornada, Clie and iPAQ) and I use them. I've even written entire novels on my PDA. The first company to release a full featured word processor for palmtops will get my money, and probably the money of quite a few of my readers (check the URL in the .sig below).

Kre

05-25-2002, 01:28 AM

thadrool

05-27-2002, 08:18 AM

I second, third, fourth, etc all of those wanting this darn program on Pocket PC. This would be THE killer app, IMO. The only thing Palm has over PPC is Wordsmith (Bluenomad.com). For the life of me, I just cannot understand how Microsoft could provide a Word program that cannot view tables, cannot do outlines past one level, and strips formatting. HOW HOW HOW??

Does that say enough about how BAD I want this program on Pocket PC? PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE. Ok, I'll stop my begging...for now.

Stephen Beesley

05-29-2002, 12:58 AM

Talk about must have software!

If the developers port this to Pocket PC then I cannot see how they could fail to make a killing. I have been trying out the beta release on my HP545 and and even on such a comparatively slow machine (and given that the software is currently coded for the HPC) I can see that it is just what I have been after.

Footnotes on my Pocket PC at last!

I just hope that when the developer ports it to PPC they retain SH3. Not every body has gone to Strong arm PPC yet.

Goldtee

jlp

05-31-2002, 04:32 AM

Hey Softmaker! Make this for the pocket pc!

Very nice! If they could cram all that into a pocket app, we`d all be in heaven :)

Im eager to see what they do in the way of a spreadsheet and database! Maybe theyd come out with a better version of Outlook, too :wink:

We have better spreadsheet than P.Excel: Spread CE and PTab
There are countless database apps
We have better Outlook: PocketInformant and Agenda Fusion

BUT WE NEEEEEEEEEED BETTER WORDPROCESSING THAN P.WORD !!!

(Did I yell loud enough :D)

kabirjt

06-03-2002, 11:58 AM

Hi,
Another vote for a useful 'word'.
I am writing my PhD - and this program would be of much use to me.
I have been a lurker for sometime and registered just to add this reply. And yes I would stomp up cash for it.
Is this available or not yet?

Thanks
Tito

blusparkles

06-06-2002, 12:58 PM

I've tried using this program using Nyditot - this program looks extremely promising - if ported over to Pocket PC is could quite easily become the "killer app" and I would buy it in a flash!

For those who have been running this program using Nyditot - how have you been inputting characters? Calligrapher doesn't appear to work (or am I missing something?), and I can't get other input panels such as Fitaly or the built-in keyboard to come up unless I have it open in another program and then switch to SoftMaker Office Anywhere with it open - plus it takes up screen real estate.

Any ideas??

danielzr

06-07-2002, 10:35 PM

Being that I just migrated from Palm to PPC, I really miss being able to read/edit sophisticated documents! This is definately something that I would want -- and Softmaker's product looks very promising from the website, if they port it to PPC -- I'll try it as is soon... Personally, most of the time I'm referring (Reading) to documents with many tables... but sometimes I do make updates (during meetings etc)-- and it's important not to lose the complicated formatting which was embedded in the original document. DataViz's Documents to Go is really great... and this package seems very promising too! There is definately a market... I think the poor quality of Pocket Word is probably in the top 10 FAQs... and comes up all the time!

corphack

06-08-2002, 12:13 AM

if you think that's a true statement; you haven't sufficiently considered the possibilities...

The only thing my laptop can do, that my iPAQ can't, is rip my pants when I put it in my pocket...

Underwater Mike

06-08-2002, 06:47 PM

:!:

Honest to God, take down my order right now!

The only hassle using NVD and a Stowaway would be getting an adapter cable to allow typing while the device is rotated. I'd settle for scrolling with a vertical screen orientation if I could actually format the document.

BTW, jlp, I disagree on the Outlook statement. We STILL need something that handles HTML email properly and isn't as slow as Inbox.

danielzr

06-09-2002, 04:06 AM

Let me add..(since there was a question about keyboards) I do have keyboards for both the Palm and PPC... I've used my Palm (before I got my PPC-I haven't gone travelling since) instead of a laptop when travelling. Making sure that you can update an MS Word document on the PPC and maintaining the MS Word formatting when syncronizing (between PPC and MS Word AND syncing between the PDA and two PCs) is a must! I've been a beta tester for Docs to Go (since I use (view/edit) quite complex documents between two computers)-- and they've really come up to speed (both literally and figuratively) on all the issues which I initially had with their product.... I'm hoping that you guys will take a look at the features of their software and take the lead here for the PPC market (as DataViz said that they don't have any intentions of going into the PPC market)! Thanks!