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The Papyrus Reviewed in 1998

Papyrus Developer is Right
By Ivan Adzhubei
Papyrus user

Papyrus 8 reviewed by Karen L. Mansbridge-Wood

Papyrus 8 reviewed by OS/2 e-Zine

 
CLICK HERE AND GET THE DEMO

Hi All.
The long-awaited new Papyrus (version 8.17) for OS/2 Warp, in English language, finally is out and just evaluated it. I downloaded the demo (papdemo.exe, 2.65MB) and tested it on my Warp Client 4.5 9Warp 4 + FP13). In 1998 I discovered Papyrus visiting Norloff's web site and I saw it such a alternative for Microsoft Word 6.0, the word processor that I used on WinOS2. Today, yet in the year 2000, I supposed that Papyrus can be an alternative for StarOffice, because it was discontinued, but now, after the test, I verified that this hypothesis is simply is not practicable. In the photo below you can see Papyrus 8 working on the main-page of my principal web site. It is running in design mode and can edit some itens, but the result is a disaster, because Papyrus can't read correctly the latest generation frames that I'm using, generated by Boxer over Namo templates.

Recently an OS/2 user reported in a mailing list: "Hi All! Finally I sucked a fantastic web editor in WYSIWYG mode for OS/2, but this one have 65 megabytes!!!". Well, man, this "fantastic web editor" is just the buggy StarOffice for OS/2, damaged by Sun Microsystems. I expected that the new Papyrus will be the solution, but unfortunately I was dreaming! Papyrus 8 for OS/2 is really a fine piece of software, a nice alternative for MS Word, but can't replace StarOffice. I decided follow using Describe as word processor and Boxer for make HTML code and that is all.

Yesterday I stopped at this point but I decided add some words on this article because the developer claimed for justice...Papyrus is really a fine piece of software and have the advantage of not consume CPU resources. In reality, I verified during my evaluation that Papyrus consumed only 1 per cent of my CPU resources working on texts. I tested it as a word processor exhaustively and you can see this fine release processing colour text in the photo below:

 Yeah, I used Papyrus 8 creating and editing several documents on Warp 4.5, evaluated it correctly and used a honest criterion. Unfortunately this word processor have not all options needed for professional purposes. The voice option is an interesting add-on but I can't consider it for my judgement. I expect that the developer improves this soft and releases a new version, enabling more edit options and more real functionality.

Today May 18 I received several e-mails from Papyrus users in defense of this soft and I read all e-mails with attention. After this lecture I concluded that he users are right and I decided remake my rating for Papyrus (3 Butterflies). Now the the rating for Papyrus 8.17 is just the below:

 
Papyrus 8 Rated 4 Butterflies

Comment on this article

by Ulli Ramps
R.O.M. Logicware GmbH, Berlin

May 17, 2000

Hi, there!

Read your "evaluation" ...

Found it somewhat weird, I have to say ...

Do you really find that demolishing sentences like ...

"... simply not practicable." ... "... result is a desaster ..."

... are the right FIRST words to describe a product you might have been
seen for a few hours, clearly not heaving read the documentation?

From the viewpoint of journalism this might be a desaster (SCNR),
nothing else.

What did you try to give these hard "first words"?

You wrote that you loaded some frame stuff. Of course this is a
"desaster", because Papyrus is not meant to read such. As you can read
in the chapter

6.6.3 What Papyrus cannot do (regarding HTML)
Part 8 of key topic HTML
...
Frames: The programming effort in relation to the effect seemed too big
to us compared to creating an HTML frame document within three minutes
in ASCII) and integrating Papyrus-made HTML pages into the frames.
In addition, frames become uncomfortable more and more, so they
disappear from the web constantly - frames steel page space.

...

So it is a "desaster" like the try to cook coffee with Papyrus - it even
isn't designed to do that, as well ...

Further on in your test:

I expected that the new Papyrus will
 be the solution, but unfortunately I was dreaming! Papyrus 8 for OS/2
is really a fine piece of software, a nice alternative for MS Word, but
can't replace StarOffice. I decided follow using Describe as word
processor

So if you find that hard words, you REALLY should prove this somehow,
give the reader some reasons (some more as that it can't read one of
your web pages, what it isn't made for) ...

Of course there are weak points in Papyrus (I expect every software to
have) but you didn't NAME such.
And you didn't give it a realistic chance by balancing the good points
and the bad points.
Our HTML is designed for different use, Papyrus isn't made for being a
web designer for all cases, we clearly state that it's level is HTML 3.2
and the philosophy is to do simple sites with good code and an easy way
to have a doc being designed for printing beneath a version for the web,
as well. Nothing else.

So you should think over if not doing such a test result after only a
few hours is somewhat unfair.

A rate your "test" (some very fast first words? ;-)) the same as you did
to Papyrus ;-).

Even a reason for why DeScribe is better than Papyrus, in your opinion,
would be of interest, if you write down it ...

Last question: How much butterflies are possible?

Editor's Note: Modern word processors works with HTML in design mode (WYSIWYG), such MS Word, StarWriter etc, in order to minimize the time consumed in web pages creation.

Photo above shows Papyrus 8 being installed on @Macarlo's Warp 4.5

Install

To install, just start "PAP_INST.EXE".

There, enter the path where the Papyrus folder should be created. If the
specified folder doesn't exist, it will be created. This currently
doesn't work for subfolders, so please create them by hand first.

Now choose if a program object 'Papyrus' should be created on the
desktop and Papyrus should be integrated into the WPS.

By clicking 'Install', the installation process is started.

If you installed the WPS support, you should reboot after this, so that
it will be enabled.

Even without this, Papyrus is ready for use. The Demo is restricted in
the following ways: single-sided printing only, b/d and c/e will
randomly be ex- changed in printouts, and the database can save only up
to 100 records.

Photo above shows the Papyrus' readme online

Versions and database

To show you many of the features a Papyrus BASE relational database offers, especially concerning calculations, the developers added an invoice database (open it by double-clicking the link). To learn more about this, R.O.M Logicware recommend to have a look at the relevant chapters in the on-line help file. 2.  Requirements Papyrus is available for Windows 95, 98, NT and 2000, for OS/2 Warp 3/4(.x) (an OS/2 2.11 version is available on special request) and will run on every system these operating systems run on (that is, from 386DX40 onwards for smooth working) when there are at least 1.5MB free RAM available. There's also a version for TOS (Atari compatible) systems. If you want to use VoiceType or ViaVoice, you can start off the dictation right after the installation of Papyrus. Here, the system requirements are somewhat higher: at least a Pentium 90 (or equivalent) with 24 MB RAM, or, if you're using ViaVoice, even a Pentium 166 with 32 Megs are the minimally required systems.

CONTACT AUTHOR

R.O.M. Logicware GmbH, Berlin

http://www.rom-logicware.com

@Macarlo, Inc.
@Macarlo's Shareware & Web
OS/2
Java Lobby Member
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