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Q10 Text Editor For Writers Review by Carl Ramirez
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Q10 Text Editor For Writers Review |
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Education
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Many writers using a Mac seem to enjoy the text editor Write Room. The idea behind this minimalist application is to give a simple interface where the only thing to do is edit text. The interface is designed to avoid any distractions and leave you free to concentrate on producing words. If you're a PC user intrigued by the idea of a bare bones text editor then you're sure to like Q10, a free text editor designed for writers by Joaquin Bernal, a Spanish fiction writer. I've been using this great little tool for three months now, and love its simple features that make writing a breeze. First Impressions When started Q10 fills the whole computer screen with an empty black background. A thin orange line cursor blinks encouragingly at the top of the page. There are no toolbars, scrollbars, menus or popup windows to distract you. Just start typing and the black screen fills with text. Optionally a discrete status bar can be shown to display statistics on the current document. The simple interface is a delight right from the first experience with Q10. It encourages writing to flow out of the fingertips and fill up page after page without distraction. Q10 leaves you with only one thing to do - type. Besides basic text input Q10 has a few other features designed to help you write more. All of the features are conveniently accessed with only a keystroke or two, these are easily discovered by pressing the F1 key to view the succinct help menu. Word Counts and Targets As well as the total count of words in a file Q10 supports up to five additional user-defined word counters. They can be used to count the number of words in the current writing session or the number of words in a chapter, for example. Each counter can be given a name of your choosing. A target word count can be set by pressing ctrl-U. As you type Q10 shows your percentage of this target in the status bar. This is a great motivator and encourages even more focus on word production. Timers You can also time your writing using the built-in alarm. It's a useful tool for free writing, word association and brainstorming sessions. It can also be used with a word count target to race to completing as many words as possible in a timed burst. This really gets the words rolling out from your fingertips. Text Expansions Quick text expansion is helpful for inserting frequently used words and short phrases. Type the first few characters in the editor and press F2, Q10 instantly inserts your saved text into the file. Notes Q10 notes are a great feature that can be used for jotting down questions, reminders or outlining. Just start a note paragraph with two dot characters, like this: .. This is a Q10 note. Notes can be viewed at any time by pressing ctrl-H. Q10 shows all the notes in the current file in a popup list, selecting one will cause the editor to jump to it instantly. Notes of different categories can also be created. Simply start the note text with specific characters. The note list can then be filtered to show only notes that match the desired category. Settings Finally, Q10's settings panel lets you configure appearance and sounds. For example, the default orange on black screen colors can be changed to suit your preferences. The settings panel is also the place where you can set up your text expansions and turn optional features like the status bar or sounds on or off. Conclusion Q10 is an excellent tool for productive writing sessions. Its biggest strength is as a tool for efficiently producing writing drafts. Getting words down on the computer is really quick and easy. When revising texts I found it to be a little less suited. The simple interface, notably the lack of mouse support, makes it slightly less effective here for anything other than short texts. All in all Q10 really does prove that "less is more". It's become my favorite tool for producing text on the computer in only a short time. I recommend any writer looking for a Windows text editor to try Q10. You can't lose - it's free... term papers for sale
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