Anecdote from a frustrated typer. There are no good word processors. MS office and Libre/open-whatever-they-call-it-now-office are bloated mess. I did a deep dive on this a few months ago, and there are 0 light/good options. There are a few that show up in google searches, but they are all disappointing in one way or another.
So, thoughts on a non-AI lightweight word processor.
What features would you expect from a good word processor? What features should it leave out, i.e. features make MS Office / OpenOffice / LibreOffice a bloated mess?
It is absolutely crazy to me that this is criteria. Office 2003 checked those boxes in that era. This was a solved thing that somehow warrants further deliberation now. I believe it is The Great Moore's Law Compensator.
Revise is that, actually. It's a free, lightweight, fast word processor at its core. It also has real-time collaboration, also free. You don't need to use the AI features.
It even supports code blocks, LaTeX, and Mermaid diagrams.
Also, the passive spelling/grammar checking in the editor is powered by LLMs and completely free. It will catch mistakes that other word processors won't, such as malapropisms.
Ty; will check it out. That wasn't one of the one I looked at.
Edit: Ah I see, from the OP. Unfortunately, I think Subscription-based, web-app, and vibe-coded would individually be deal breakers. Combined indicates it's not the sort of tool I seek.
I've built an agent loop that has a self-review step, and it's pretty good at catching mistakes. It's able to scan the document in chunks and use tools to surgically change small parts.
I started building this 10 months ago, largely using agentic coding tools. I've stayed very involved in the code base and architecture, and have never moved faster in my life as a dev.
The word processor engine and rendering layer are all built from scratch - the only 3rd party library I used was the excellent Y.js for the CRDT stack.
I do a decent amount of writing on my blog and for work so I was thinking, "why doesn't this product appeal to me?"
I think I'm hesitant to spent yet another monthly subscription on something. I get decent mileage just copying and pasting sections into Claude so it's hard to justify another $8 a month on another tool.
I also do a decent amount of my editing in raw markdown files and apply styling almost as a post-process. Part of the problem is that I'm always pasting documents into corporate portals (Confluence, Wiki's, Google Docs) and they don't always copy formatting in the way I'd expect. So I just write raw text and format it after paste.
Thanks for the feedback. The pitch with Revise is it's a fully integrated agent inside a word processor. The "copy and paste between ChatGPT and docs" is the workflow I set out to improve on a la PG's "find something people are doing and figure out a way to do it that doesn't suck." I think you'd find it's a much better user experience, especially when you're iterating a lot on something.
I get that subscriptions turn some people off, and I'm open to other ideas of how to make a project like this financially sustainable. I don't want to do ads :)
Can this be integrated inside of something like Google Docs or Microsoft Word? Or is that more of an aspiration at this point? The vibe I got from the landing page was that it's a standalone app.
Not without having control over those products and their source code, which is why I built an alternative. From my testing, the Revise agent is more capable than Gemini+Docs and Copilot are right now.
Why don't you use your local open source llm, without the interaction of big models?
I mean, more work, but you don't need to pay your cut to them. Just asking.
Anecdote from a frustrated typer. There are no good word processors. MS office and Libre/open-whatever-they-call-it-now-office are bloated mess. I did a deep dive on this a few months ago, and there are 0 light/good options. There are a few that show up in google searches, but they are all disappointing in one way or another.
So, thoughts on a non-AI lightweight word processor.
I am not a defender of Word (2024) but it starts in 1-2 seconds in my laptop.
Actually the speed is a problem when you have hundreds of pages with track changes and comments.
Maybe you should check Wordperfect or WordStar ;)
What features would you expect from a good word processor? What features should it leave out, i.e. features make MS Office / OpenOffice / LibreOffice a bloated mess?
Start fast (maybe <100ms), respond instantly, good UX.
It is absolutely crazy to me that this is criteria. Office 2003 checked those boxes in that era. This was a solved thing that somehow warrants further deliberation now. I believe it is The Great Moore's Law Compensator.
AbiWord
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AbiWord
Ty. I looked at that, and unfortunately cannot recall why I rejected it.
Revise is that, actually. It's a free, lightweight, fast word processor at its core. It also has real-time collaboration, also free. You don't need to use the AI features.
It even supports code blocks, LaTeX, and Mermaid diagrams.
Also, the passive spelling/grammar checking in the editor is powered by LLMs and completely free. It will catch mistakes that other word processors won't, such as malapropisms.
Ty; will check it out. That wasn't one of the one I looked at.
Edit: Ah I see, from the OP. Unfortunately, I think Subscription-based, web-app, and vibe-coded would individually be deal breakers. Combined indicates it's not the sort of tool I seek.
lol, ok bro
What exactly would the perfect tool look like?
Perfect isn't the goal. But something on the tier of KiCad, Blender, Zed, Sublime, etc.
How do you make sure the LLM catches and reports all grammar mistakes if I ask for it?
I've built an agent loop that has a self-review step, and it's pretty good at catching mistakes. It's able to scan the document in chunks and use tools to surgically change small parts.
Er, is right click disabled on this page? Certainly seems to be in any browser I pick. If so, why?
Unintended, thanks. fixed
Wonderful product :)
Looks really cool!
I started building this 10 months ago, largely using agentic coding tools. I've stayed very involved in the code base and architecture, and have never moved faster in my life as a dev.
The word processor engine and rendering layer are all built from scratch - the only 3rd party library I used was the excellent Y.js for the CRDT stack.
Would love some feedback!
This looks wonderful!
I do a decent amount of writing on my blog and for work so I was thinking, "why doesn't this product appeal to me?"
I think I'm hesitant to spent yet another monthly subscription on something. I get decent mileage just copying and pasting sections into Claude so it's hard to justify another $8 a month on another tool.
I also do a decent amount of my editing in raw markdown files and apply styling almost as a post-process. Part of the problem is that I'm always pasting documents into corporate portals (Confluence, Wiki's, Google Docs) and they don't always copy formatting in the way I'd expect. So I just write raw text and format it after paste.
Thanks for the feedback. The pitch with Revise is it's a fully integrated agent inside a word processor. The "copy and paste between ChatGPT and docs" is the workflow I set out to improve on a la PG's "find something people are doing and figure out a way to do it that doesn't suck." I think you'd find it's a much better user experience, especially when you're iterating a lot on something.
I get that subscriptions turn some people off, and I'm open to other ideas of how to make a project like this financially sustainable. I don't want to do ads :)
Can this be integrated inside of something like Google Docs or Microsoft Word? Or is that more of an aspiration at this point? The vibe I got from the landing page was that it's a standalone app.
Not without having control over those products and their source code, which is why I built an alternative. From my testing, the Revise agent is more capable than Gemini+Docs and Copilot are right now.
This would really work well for teams. Are there any limits into how many people can collaborate on Revise?
No enforced limits right now, but HN might find the performance bounds of my backend today. I am planning to add team/org accounts soon!
Looks nice, very nice.
Why don't you use your local open source llm, without the interaction of big models? I mean, more work, but you don't need to pay your cut to them. Just asking.
Yes, an eventual goal is to let Revise use a local LLM.
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