In Praise of Rich Text Format — the Universal Format for Writers
With release of Microsoft Word 2007 and yet another new file format just days away, this is an appropriate time to discuss the importance and applicability of Rich Text Format for fiction and non-fiction writers. Sounds like a dull topic? OK. But there are major implications for the serious writer.
Most of us never think about “formats.” We just click and save.
Yet the more active we become as writers, the more likely it is that we must trade our work with others, manipulate our text in other programs, like page layout programs, or post our articles on a blog. There is one format that can easily move our text, along with its formatting of type font, boldface and italics, to other writers and programs — and even between PC’s and Mac’s. Of course, that format is RTF, or Rich Text Format.
Microsoft Word, which most of us use, by default saves files in the well-known .doc format. The new Word 2007 introduces the .docx format, which earlier versions will be unable to read.
It’s easy enough to work around these formats. Click the “Save As” command, rather than “Save.” Then you will be presented with other format options, including RTF, if you scroll down far enough.
It’s time for us to begin thinking and using RTF. Why do I make such a point of this? Because once we begin thinking Rich Text Format, many other word processing options present themselves to us — and many of them are better tailored for ficition and non-fiction writers than business-oriented Word.
Over coming weeks and months, we will examine in detail a number of these word-processing options, with enough screenshots that you can understand the capabilities they present particularly crafted for writers. Chances are good that one or another may appeal to you.
The major point of this blog is to help you find and choose the options best suited to you. Without such a guide, it is a daunting task to search them out, to test them, to make informed comparisons. I’ve been sorting through many of these options for the past year and a half — and I’m beginning to turn to some of these options frequently. I hope my experience will save you a great deal of time and will lead you to options that will make you more productive.
If you want to see just how many word-processing options there are, take a glance as Wikipedia’s Word Processor Charts. Overwhelming, isn’t it? And even this list is not complete. Well, within a few months, we’ll pick out the gems for serious writers and acquaint you with them.
If you want to read a more complete explanation about word-processing formats and the particular utility of RTF, take a look at Richard Salsbury’s article on the subject. He knows it well, as he’s the developer responsible for the Rough Draft word processor, which I’ll write about a few days from now.
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[…] PageFour maintains its files in Rich Text Format, or RTF, the format which I think should be preferred by writers [for explanation, see this post]. Each notebook, folder and page is saved as a separate entity, rather than pulling an entire major work into a single file. Beginning in version 1.60, pages can be easily merged for printing out an entire manuscript for hard-copy submission. […]
[…] However, I am surprised that there are significant omissions, those programs aimed more at creative writers and journalists. As I too have been steadily working my way through this same arena, with several major reviews already posted on this blog, I have some observations and comments about the review, from my perspective. Reviewer and self-professed “software nut” Zaine Ridling, who maintains The Great Software List, begins at just the right point: all writers are not the same, and word processors tend to fit some writers better than others. It’s a good idea to do some exploration to find the most productive tool for your own style of writing. In fact, one might end up using several word processors, each with strengths for particular writing tasks. Then Zaine takes up the next most important question: what format is best for writers.  At this point, his decided bias as a “software nut” shines through. He declares firmly for the emerging Open Document Format. Over the long haul, he’s probably correct. Yet even he recognizes Microsoft’s continuing role as bottleneck to interoperability, even in its latest incarnation Word 2007. Meanwhile, the Rich Text Format [see my comments about RTF] performs well for non-technical writers and is easy to share. It happens to be the format adopted by the word processors Zaine has left off his list. […]
[…] read one of his earlier articles, In Praise of Rich Text Format - The Universal Format for Writers, and started thinking about how I archive my stories on my laptop. I didn’t do anything about […]