On other forums I have read that Word's master document feature has some serious problems. Here is a quote:

John McGhie put it succinctly when he said that "there are two kinds of Master Documents: Those that are corrupt and those that will be corrupt soon." It was reported fixed in Word 2007, but "The jury is in: The Master Document feature in Word 2010 remains word processing's answer to Conan the Destroyer. Use it only if you enjoy pain and frustration." Microsoft Word 2010 Bible by Herb Tyson, MVP. "Since its inception, the Master Documents feature has been a bit quirky and buggy, and that fact hasn't changed with Word 2010, unfortunately." Microsoft Word 2010 In Depth by Faithe Wempen, p. 681

(a) Since this quote applies to Word 2010, I wonder if it applies to 2013?

(b) More generally, how would users with experience with master documents assess its functionality?

Mike

You are quoting me. It actually applies to all versions of Word that have the so-called Master Documents "Feature". There is no reason to think it has been fixed. You are welcome to be the test case but I wouldn't recommend doing it with anything that is important to you. I have not tried it in Word 2013.

I have read the published books on Word 2013 and see nothing that gives me any reason to advise someone to put valuable work in this format.

Charles,

Thanks for your comment. It amazes me that the world's leading word processor can't do master documents properly.

Mike

Back in the days when WordPerfect was (arguably) the world's leading word processor, it did not do master documents very well either. Although (arguably) it did it better than Word has ever done. The problem I think lies inherent in the concept of multiple files and the I\O involved. I\O has been, and remains, the leading cause of corruption.

IMO Word itself is robust enough to handle most situations that one can think of that in theory master documents are supposed to handle.

Since Fumei has mentioned Another Product by name, I'll out myself as a long-term user of FrameMaker, and interested observer – to field questions from colleagues who write up their own information to send me as input – of Word. FM 'books' just … work.

While we're at it, I've not managed really encouraging results with Open/Libre Office master documents either :-}

I agree. Since Word 2003, at least, very few documents need to be split into multiple files, at least on a modern computer with multiple Gb of RAM. For those that do need this, RD fields seem to be part of the answer.

The inclusion of this "feature" was the marketing people trying to match Word Perfect, probably over the objections/reservations of the technical people. I wish they could be held accountable for the grief they have caused many people, primarily graduate students.

I agree. Word tried to make master docs in order to try and match WP, which did handle them (mostly) reasonably well. But Word master docs have ALWAYS been a disaster. They have never been well engineered. And yeah, whoever put that gong show into Word should have had their paychecks printed out from a master doc, with every single character of the check in separate sub-docs....

Good luck with that. After more than a decade of grief I wish they would just kill it. No one will miss it.

As for FrameMaker, quite a different kettle of fish. Great great application! Sigh. I also miss using Quark. I disliked Word also trying to be a graphic layout application. Mind you it is better than it used to be, but really, keep the darn thing a top level word processor.

This discussion has been very helpful to me. Thanks to everyone who's contributed.

Given that Framemaker has been mentioned, I would appreciate extending the discussion a bit to desktop publishing.

I am writing a book that will combine text on the right-handed page with graphics (mostly photos) on the opposite page. Thus, there will be a lot of page layout work.

At present, my plan is to develop all the text in Word and then bring that into a desktop publishing program like PagePlus, where I will integrate it with the graphics. I want the final product to be ready for delivery to a professional printer.

Does that sound like a sensible approach?

Will PagePlus be a good program for this process? Or should I use something more powerful like Framemaker (which is a lot more expensive)?

Or should I just stay with Word for the entire project?

Your thoughts will be appreciated.

My two cents.

Stay with Word for the entire project? Simply put, NO. If you have a legitimate alternative, take it. While true Word is capable of performing sort of, so-so, (Ok, sometimes it is capable of good) layout, again, if you have a legitimate real layout application IMO, use it.

I am not familiar with Page Plus, but I took a look at its page. This is the $99 one. It looks decent enough. Probably better than what Word can do. Don`t know what the learning curve would be. Are you familiar with it?


I notice that it has eBook support. That may be a smart feature on their part, along with everything else. eBook and Word issues have come up in the forums more and more.

Oh, and if you wish to go further along this line (layout), it would be best to start a different thread. It is a subject distinctly NOT connected to the subject of this thread.

FrameMaker could take that sort of layout in its stride, but it's generally asserted InDesign is better for fancier layouts. Final thought before this thread migrates to another environment: for consistent text and graphics on facing pages at a less-than-Adobe price, perhaps Scribus? haven't done anything serious in it myself.

I have a sort of related question, but I've started a new thread since this one got a little long. I'd appreciate any input to this topic:

https://www.msofficeforums.com/word/...html#post69819