Textmaker (Softmaker/Ashampoo Office) 2008

[tomos]

I got the update to Softmaker/Ashampoo Office cheaply thanks to Curt (pre-Christmas special)

To be honest I use it very little so cant really comment much on improvements over the 2006
(now has PowerPoint equivalent though),
but it's still very fast!

One thing I was looking forward to was PDF creation
Unfortunately it's terrible (- polite version )

A simple one page table/text with two three* fonts came to 2MB with fonts embedded
and wouldnt even show properly on the same computer without the fonts embedded (fonts were Times New Roman and Courier* - shouldnt be rocket science). Final PDF was total gobbledegook actually

Dont want to put anyone off this programme just a little pipped (- polite version again..) and needed to let off some steam

un-PC, ever so slightly...

in the lite of recent topic/s I'm experimenting with "polite"
just doesnt make the grade for letting off steam though...
Feck it

* edit/ three fonts - third is arial, still no rocket science, OOo makes a PDF of 100KB or so of same file

EDIT/  an update corrected the PDF problem and it's quite good now - read post#9 in particular

[Darwin]

Have you posted this in the SoftMaker forum? Just wondering because they are generally pretty quick to respond there and this issue would, I think, be fixed quickly if they can replicate it. Right, off to check the forum to see if it has been discussed...

[Darwin]

Hmm... no one's mentioned it there. If you want to post in that forum, point your browser here: http://www.softmaker.com/forum/index.php. You might need to register to use the forum first...

[tomos]

tail between legs...suppose you right

when I use PDF export so seldom for word docs (once a month for an invoice!)
I'm lazy to follow up on it ...

well you made it very easy for me finding the link and all thanks Mike

[tomos]

Hmm... no one's mentioned it there. If you want to post in that forum, point your browser here: http://www.softmaker.com/forum/index.php. You might need to register to use the forum first...

done, posted at their forums, will update here - [it's still a problem for me...or for me and Textmaker!]

[Darwin]

Funny - I actually have SoftMaker Office 2008 installed (academic licencing is a wonderful thing) and had meant to test this out myself. Of course, I've forgotten. I'll try and do so today or tomorrow and post back here with my own "experiences".

[tomos]

Funny - I actually have SoftMaker Office 2008 installed (academic licencing is a wonderful thing) and had meant to test this out myself. Of course, I've forgotten. I'll try and do so today or tomorrow and post back here with my own "experiences".

please do
there's relatively few posts at the Softmaker2008 forums yet so it would be great to know if this just me

Problems:

• huge file size (almost 2MB for one page with the three fonts mentioned above) with "embed only embeddable.." selected
• totally unreadable PDFs with "do not embed.." selected

[tomos]

Mike!
check first are you using "revision 482" I'm not and Ashampoo version says I'm uptodate..so awaiting reply from Softmaker, will post again

[tomos]

Support/ServicePack/etc =
http://www.softmaker.com/english/servofw8_en.htm
for Version 482

[tomos]

well now much better

File with fonts embedded comes to 167KB File without fonts embedded is readable except for the following # it can handle é but not ´ # it cant handle ' a single apostrophe like would normally be used in Tom's or in some surnames e.g. O'Connor # it cant handle euro symbol €

thread is here if anyone has PDF problems!

[CWuestefeld]

Just got a marketing email from them, touting their new 2008 release. It notes one significant difference between the Softmaker and Ashampoo versions of the product:

Please note that only genuine SoftMaker Office 2008 contains the BasicMaker macro language, not the licensed Ashampoo Office.

For the vast majority of users this probably doesn't matter, but the folks on DC are probably more likely to be power users that might want scripting capability.

Here are the major bullet points on the new version:

SoftMaker Office offers four new and improved applications:

• TextMaker 2008 with many enhancements such as PDF export, OLE server capabilities, a style manager, print preview, envelope printing and, and, and...
• PlanMaker 2008, the latest version of our spreadsheet application.
  Now with OLE server capability, PDF export, new calculation functions and many other improvements.
• SoftMaker Presentations 2008, SoftMaker's brand new alternative to PowerPoint. Just as capable, but much easier to use!
• BasicMaker 2008, our new VBA-compatible macro language that lets you automate TextMaker and PlanMaker like in Microsoft Office.

[Darwin]

One thing I'd like to know is if DataMaker - which is supposed to be released to beta January 2008 and as a full release February 2008 is going to be part of a service pack or available as an upgrade? I had really hoped that it was going to make it into the final release of 2008...

[CWuestefeld]

One thing I'd like to know is if DataMaker

After looking at their web site, I'm not enthused:

DataMaker 2008 works with any ODBC or ADO database. It will ship with a very fast database driver for the dBASE database format, but you are not limited to that: You can use DataMaker to access databases from MySQL, SQL Server, IBM DB/2, PostgreSQL, Oracle, Microsoft Access etc. – all databases for which ODBC or ADO drivers exist. (emphasis mine)

dBase is a nonstarter for me, since there's no provision for protecting it from multiprocess accesses. Your average Joe won't be able to set up mySQL, and if you've got Access, Oracle, SQL Server, etc., then I don't see much that this product will offer.

[Darwin]

Hmm... I'm on revision 482 already, but thanks for directing me to check for updates, Tom! I'm checking out pdf creation now (well, next, actually) and will report back.

[Darwin]

Well... SoftMaker TextMaker (rev. 482) exported a 63kb, 4 page, Word Document to a pdf that is 134kb in size. This is with the "embed only embedable font"s setting applied and at Low (96dpi) quality with auto table of contents generated. I printed the same file from within SoftMaker to Scansoft PDF Creator at medium quality with embed fonts enabled and it produced a pdf of just 16kb in size (complete with TOC). So... the current SoftMaker revision is better than it was, but far from optimized.

[tomos]

well, with version 482 it works okay as long as you embed fonts and select "Embed only used characters"
as said in post #9 I had some problems with obscure characters when fonts arent embedded

üüps, missed your last post

[tomos]

Well... SoftMaker TextMaker (rev. 482) exported a 63kb, 4 page, Word Document to a pdf that is 134kb in size. This is with the "embed only embedable font"s setting applied and at Low (96dpi) quality with auto table of contents generated. I printed the same file from within SoftMaker to Scansoft PDF Creator at medium quality with embed fonts enabled and it produced a pdf of just 16kb in size (complete with TOC). So... the current SoftMaker revision is better than it was, but far from optimized.

you sure Scansoft is embedding those fonts thats incredibly small, mind you I usually make PDFs with more than one font. The quality usually only effects graphics (I think)

[edit] I think the 134kb file size would be similar to OpenOffice/Nova PDF going by my test files here

[tomos]

I also got an email from Softmaker

---------------------------------------------------------------------- BasicMaker manual as a PDF file ---------------------------------------------------------------------- You requested it, we complied... Now you can download the full documentation for the BasicMaker macro language as a PDF file from our web site - perfect for reading and printing. Download: http://www.softmaker.net/down/bm2008manual_en.pdf

[Darwin]

Busted! You're right - the Scansoft option was to embed non-standard fonts. My document only contains Times New Roman. Switching to "embed all fonts" in Scansoft results in a 123kb file. I owe SoftMaker an apology 

[tomos]

Busted! You're right - the Scansoft option was to embed non-standard fonts. My document only contains Times New Roman. Switching to "embed all fonts" in Scansoft results in a 123kb file. I owe SoftMaker an apology 

so Texttmaker make one almost half the size of Scansofts! - that's probably due to the "Embed only used characters" option

... File without fonts embedded is readable except for the following # it can handle é but not ´ * # it cant handle ' a single apostrophe like would normally be used in Tom's or in some surnames e.g. O'Connor # it cant handle euro symbol €

-
they dont seem too interested in resolving the above issues -
(they blamed Adobe - who probably dont help but werent the problem here)
it probably is safer to embed fonts but it's always nice to have options...

* for some reason they normally use ´ (as in é without the e) instead of apostrophe here in Germany - I think because the apostrophe isnt natively used

[edit] added some emphasis!

[Darwin]

so Texttmaker make one almost half the size of Scansofts! - that's probably due to the "Embed only used characters" option

No - it was the original word doc that was 63kb - TextMaker produced a pdf from it that is 134kb in size versus Scansoft's 123kb pdf. They're close, though (and it's almost impossible to exactly line up the ticked options in each, so this probably isn't a fair comparison anyway).

I'll have to try this little experiment again with a more complex document - I literally went for the first that I found! I'll try to remember to do so later today. If I can replicate this and start prodding SoftMaker for a fix as well, maybe something will happen.


edit by jgpaiva: fixed quote tag

[TucknDar]

*BUMP*

I'm curious as to how well it writes (and reads) MS Office docs. I mostly use OpenOffice, but seeing as this company claims they have full compatibility with ms office I might be interested. Did any of you try to save documents with several pictures, frame boxes and formatting and then look at it in word?

[tomos]

*BUMP*

I'm curious as to how well it writes (and reads) MS Office docs. I mostly use OpenOffice, but seeing as this company claims they have full compatibility with ms office I might be interested. Did any of you try to save documents with several pictures, frame boxes and formatting and then look at it in word?

that's why I got it TucknDar -
I was having trouble with formatting and tables getting messed up going from OOo to Word

I'm very happy with it but I dont put it to much use to be honest -
with tables seems fine, pics I dont know...

I know Darwin had a few reservations about formatting I'm sure he'll post about them..

[TucknDar]

thanks, tomos! Now let's see what Darwin has to say

[Armando]

When I tested textmaker a while ago (2006) it was able to convert very well -- albeit not perfectly -- my immensely complex documents full of tables, frames, drawings, etc. Sometimes, some aspects of the layout were not preserved perfectly : frames were not positioned exactly at the same place (it could be that the new version converts better though), or something like that. At that time, I actually found that Open Office was usually much better at preserving the layout... Oh well.

Must add that I didn't try the reverse process you describe: saving a doc in textmaker and opening it in MS Word. (Stupid, I know.)

Some of the reasons I can quickly remember concerning why I didn't buy Textmaker -- apart form the layout problems I was not ready to deal with : 1- I couldn't find how to "hide" comments the way MS Word can (and have them appear in a separate pane so that it does not mess the with pagination), 2- scrolling was not as smooth and full featured (I scroll a lot, I need multiple speeds), 3- contrarily to Zaine, I didn't find that it started as fast as MS Word, 4- I'm addicted to MS Words outlining capabilities, 5- French proofing was definitely not as sophisticated. That's all I can remember for now, but there were probably better reasons, of course .

It's still an outstanding product.