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May 15, 2014
Dear Ms/Mr? Carson, (at car...@wistly.net)
IF YOU CAN THINK OF ANY EARTHLY EXCUSE NOT TO REPLY TO THIS LETTER, PLEASE
DO SO.
Thank you very much for your prompt, and comprehensible, response to my
"take-a-chance" query. It was very reassuring -- unfortunately (for you), it
also emboldens me to refine my questions/fears more specifically.
Please pardon the imposition of some history but it may serve to specify
more exactly my dilemma/uncertainty.
I am a retired physician (Internal Medicine, for 50 years) whose hobby has
long been crosswords. Since 1986 (when I first began constructing puzzles,
I have had over 700 published in every medium conceivable here in the USA)
In my early constructing days, there was (to me, at least) no computer
stuff available. I would lay out a page with my ruler, fill in the black
squares with pencil and then start constructing. It was a real pain because
the
necessary changes as the construction proceeded would make holes in the
paper -- and that meant starting on another sheet. All this was exceeded in
frustration only by the drudgery of typing clues in one column, solutions in
another -- and then finding one had to retype the whole thing because of a
skipped clue/solution.(I have never learned to type so it's always
hunt-and-peck for me). Then the manuscript was snail-mailed to my various
editors.
All this changed when an astrophysicist (I believe) (in England somewhere)
came up with his
crossword puzzle constructing software. It is expensive but all my editors
want it used. No snail mail, at all, to anyone.
You enter his program and start to work. You can put the black squares
anywhere you want, delete them easily, put them elsewhere, etc. etc. (It's an
extremely complex program doing all kinds of multi-national puzzles
diagrams, etc. I only use the basic American section.)
Now the specific specifics: I use the computer to type in the letters for
the puzzle words, change black squares, etc. Then I choose (still in his
program) "Clues" and I make up my definitions, type them in, erase them. etc.
in a wonderfully less drudgery manner.
I have no idea what his mechanisms are for any of this stuff. Nor would I
be capable of comprehending them. I just do them,
Then, when the puzzle is finished and ready to be attached to my e-mail to
the editor, I call up the puzzle on my flash drive. My "big time" editors
(at Simon and Schuster, Dell, etc) also have that same program installed so
all I have to do is attach my puzzle icon to the e-mail and it gets there
intact somehow.
BUT, some of the local newspapers and magazines who publish my stuff are
not in the crossword puzzle business. They are publishing tons of other stuff
and have no reason to fork over money for the program.
This was the solution arrived at after many trial and error failures::Call
up the puzzle on the flash drive. (By now it is already a creature of the
program because it was constructed in that program) Go to "file", then
"export" in his program. For some editors, I then switch from whatever appears
on the screen to "picture". I select "Jpeg" and now export the puzzle, in
its changed form, back to my flash drive, ready to be attached to my e-mail
to the editor. I do this twice: once for the GRID page and once for the
SOLUTION page. Other editors want these 2 things in PDF (whatever that means)
rather than "picture". The program easily allows for both the GRID and
SOLUTION pages to be so prepared.
At last: the problem: (Up until last week, when I downloaded Open Office
--a freebie -- so that I could access my many Word documents from my XP
machine. ((I now have a Dell Inspiron tabletop and Windows 8.1) all that I am
about to describe went smoothly both when I had Word on my XP and for the 3
months I had only WordPad on my 8.1.
I would call up from my flash drive the puzzle, switch from "picture" or
PDF, choose "plain text" and only "CLUES" from the "File" section of the
program. For the non-big-time editors, I then have to call up "CLUES" and
modify/correct it to the extent that I have to type in the formal name of the
puzzle and the name of the constructor (me) both at top and bottom. I save it
and now all is ready to be attached to the e-mail
BUT, BUT, last week, when I clicked on "clues" (to put in the puzzle title
and my name), for the first time ever a screen came up called ASCII Filter
Options. It had 3 properties: Character set: Arabic (ISO-8859-6) Default
fonts: Times New Roman (I use Arial 10) and Language: English (USA). At the
bottom of this screen was: Paragraph break: CR & LF were highlighted while
CR and LF by themselves were not highlighted.
When I said OK, a new screen opened. It was called Open Office 4.0.1 These
words now appeared: This document may contain formatting or content that
cannot be saved in the Text Encoded file format. Do you want to save this
document in this format anyway? Use the latest ODF file format and be sure all
formatting and content is daved corectly. Below that were two boxes: Keep
Current Format and Save in ODF format. The first one was
framed/highlighted. Finally, below that was a checked statement; Ask when not
saving in ODF
format.
My "guru" advised me: Your problem is indeed using the Open Office program
to open the ,txt file instead of just using a simple text editor. He had me
choose "Settings" at the right side of my screen. At its bottom, I chose
Change PC settings. I now chose Search and Apps. Then, at the next screen, I
chose Defaults and then, at the very bottom, "Choose default apps by file
type". A huge list of stuff appeared, alphabetically. He guided me down to
.txt. The picture next to it was called Open Office. He made me left click
the picture called Open Office and choose WordPad from the subsequent list
(definitely not NotePad)
Now "Clues" worked as always. I almost wept in relief (I'm the man who once
erased the entire hard drive)
That's the whole story which prompted my letter yesterday.
May I ask you further questions:
1) Would it be better for a klutz like me just to delete Open Office
altogether and use the freebie WordPad that came packaged with 8.1?
2) If I decide to use Open Office's Writer as my word processor, should I
somehiow delete Wordpad?
3) Is there any danger at all that, if I used Open Office Writer as my
wordprocessor (I now use WorpPad), it will automatically change that ,txt thing
from WordPad back to Open Office?
4) IN SPECIFIC REFERENCE TO YOUR KIND LETTER: If, using Writer, I choose
"Save as" (your suggestion), which is the specific "plain text" letters I
should choose? .txt? those for Rich text? Others? (I have no idea of what the
purchased crossword program uses for anything.)
I know I have taken advantage of your courtesy by biting the hand that fed
me. Even though you may feel it prudent not to answer this, thank you for
taking the time to read it,
Arthur
