Word Processor For OS X, Preferably free and/or Open Source

[JavaCowboy]

OpenOffice, while adequate, isn't all that great on OS X, especially since it's essentially an OS X port of OpenOffice that runs under X11.

I tried opening an RTF file in AppleWorks and it crashed on me, so that's out.

For idealogical reasons, I refuse to use MS Office.

Is there a good, stable word processor for OS X with a basic but reliable set of features? If all it does is reliably edit RFT files, I'll be happy.

[Gon]

You haven't tried Abiword? It's native, at least.

[dobby]

Try NeoOffice http://www.neooffice.org/
Its like openoffice without X11. I run it on a B&W 300Mhz iwth 512 MB and it isn't that slow (except to open for the first time).

Dobby.

[Token]

Free:

Abiword (Great for smaller documents, bad for large stuff)
Neooffice/J (the java port of OpenOffice, better than the X11 version)

Cheap:
Mellel
Nisus Writer Express
Mariner Write

Of the above I would recommend Abiword or Mariner write for best Word import capability. Nisus has the best 'Mac OS X' feel in its latest incarnation.

NeoOffice is pretty good at the price, though ;-)

[Gon]

Forgot to mention... personally I'd also look at iWork or specifically Pages. Even if it's not free, not open source, it looks pretty damn good and suitable for word processor and low level DTP in one package.

Real Men (tm) of course do their editing in a text editor, like emacs or vim. :) For personal work I keep everything text. For school assignments I find myself still using text editors, but publishing the completed work by copying it into a word processor and doing the fonts etc. there as a one time job before I turn in the paper. I think Pages would be great for this. I'm uncomfortable with LaTeX and think it cumbersome but there's not much choice when you do a large project, have to return multiple copies of the same document (snapshots in time), and want to keep everything in text for CVS. So I use LaTeX sometimes too.

[Paul]

TextEdit

works great.

[Hobbes]

Originally posted by Paul
TextEdit

works great.

Yeah, for editing RTF files, use TextEdit -- you can augment it w/ the free WordService if you need word count, sorting, etc.

[New]

how aboutTextWrangler (http://www.barebones.com/products/textwrangler/index.shtml)?

[Relic]

VI :smokey:

[dobby]

Originally posted by Relic
VI :smokey:

Yeah a real word processor.:lol:
What about emacs?:D

Dobby

[MCQ]

Progression of thread:
Full featured (AbiWord/NeoOffice) --> Mid level (Nisus, Mellel, Pages) --> GUI plain text editor (TextWrangler) --> CLI text editor (vi/emacs)

WTF? :D