Ah! Yes, that'll do just fine! Haha

Thanks Pete. 🙂

Oh, there absolutely are some quality free apps out there — GIMP is a viable alternative to Photoshop for many, for example — but you have to spend a long time trawling through absolute garbage before finding something worthwhile in many cases.

I don't love Office either, but there's no getting around the fact it is the industry standard and the most compatible suite of productivity software out there. I much prefer iWork to work on, but there are things it struggles with at times, so occasionally I have to use Office.

Actually I think there exist an amazing amount of free apps of high quality. But maybe not for that particular purpose (there are plenty, but not so advanced).

I tried Open Office many years ago and wasn't impressed. But I am not impressed with MS Office either (which is what I use on my Mac… because that's what I am used to), at least not Word.

That is fair enough! You do often get what you pay for with productivity apps — compare OpenOffice to iWork and Microsoft Office for an example — but if you can't afford it, you can't afford it, and that's fine.

The thing to do, I guess, is download the trial (if you can!) and give it a shot for a little while. If it seems to be something that appeals, then it's maybe something to set a little aside for until you can afford it. If it doesn't, no great loss!

Maybe the servers. Or maybe my laptop has an off day;-)

It is fair enough that (some) apps cost money so the programmers can eat, but my aversion to paid apps isn't about fairness… I just can't afford anything that isn't free for the time being.

No, it's not free. It's £31 for the Mac version in the UK — I'd assume the Windows version is a similar price. It downloaded pretty quickly for me (though I do have a pretty fast connection here) — perhaps you caught the servers on an off day? 🙂

If you're looking for something like Scrivener for Windows, may I suggest… Scrivener? 🙂

http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php?platform=win