Blog Authoring with Word 12/2007

As you may have noticed, assuming you have scanned over my previous posts, I am currently using Microsoft's Word 12/2007 to author my blog posts. There are a number of reasons for this:

1. I have been a heavy user of Word since Word version 2 (circa 1990). Although it was technically Word version 2 it was marketed as Word for Windows 1.0 and was for use on Windows 3.0—just to totally confuse everyone. Anyway, the point I am making here is that I have been using Word for some time now and know it very well.


2. Word allows me to easily use bullets, numbering, and indenting without having to think too much about it.


3. I can easily put in simple tables.


4. I can easily include images (mainly photographs) and position them how I want (within the limits imposed by Wordpress and conversion to HTML when posting).


5. I can colour and highlight text easily.


6. Spell checking happens as I key (as it always does in Word).


7. I can save a copy of each blog post on my PC.

I am sure there are other reasons I have overlooked, but those are the main ones I can think of.

As is *always* the case with computers and computer software, Word is not a perfect solution. Take tables for example. Although they are quick and easy to include, as you can see from the following, they do not always format as expected when posted up into the blog. Here is a 75% downsized screen capture image of what the table looked like when I keyed it in Word.



And following is how it posted into the blog.

Versions of Microsoft Word
Internal Version Number	Marketed As	Circa
7	Word 95 (Office 95)	1995
8	Word 97 (Office 97)	1997
9	Word 2000 (Office 2000)	2000
10	Word XP (Office XP)	2002
11	Word 2003 (Office 2003)	2003
12	Word 2007 (Office 2007)	2007
13	[this version number skipped due to bad vibes]	-
14	Word 2010 (Office 2010)	2010

 As you can see:

• The sans-serif font used for the table heading has become a serif font.


• The triple wrapped first column heading has become un-wrapped into two lines.

Not too bad really but such are the joys of automatic conversions to HTML. Even so, at this point anyway, I am finding using Microsoft Word is a good way to author and prepare blog postings.

Barry.