Still waiting for the computer guy to come over and fix my main computer. I spent hours trying to do it myself which probably means either (a) it's totally unfixable and I'll need a new one which I hope I won't or (b) he'll fix it in ninety seconds and make me feel like The Dunce of the World for not knowing the easy solution. I'm not sure which will make me feel better.
Speaking of Computer Stuff: I asked here about software programs for writing comic book scripts and several of you offered suggestions. I tested out the ones that offered free trial versions and found them all to be either way too complicated or designed by someone who had aberrant notions of how to format a comic book script. The "too complicated" ones exemplified what I find wrong with too many computer programs: They try to do way too much. What you need them for is like 3% of what the program will do but that 3% is buried in complexities and menus and sub-menus and sub-sub-menus for the other 97% which you'll never use.
I am reminded of back in the Mesolithic Period when home computers and "word processing" were new and a lot of us were guardedly learning whole new ways of writing and — eventually — just about everything else we did. I started on a program called Spellbinder, which was beastly simple to learn but compatible with absolutely nothing else. An otter could have seated itself at my keyboard and begun writing a screenplay on it in two minutes and I suspect some did.
But I was working with other writers and one of them was using WordStar, one of them was using WordPerfect, one was using Microsoft Word, etc., and they could do nothing with my files and I could do nothing with theirs. Spellbinder, to compete with the Big Boys, added all sorts of bells and whistles and deluxe features…just about everything except compatibility with anything else. The new Spellbinder could format the Magna Carta in Esperanto while squeezing fresh orange juice for you and giving tap dance lessons…but it was slow and clunky for writing and I, though more computer-savvy that most, couldn't figure out how to compose a note to my milkman on it.
Spellbinder didn't remain in business for long after they did that. I'm sure I wasn't the only user who fled…in my case, to Wordstar, which at the time was the most popular word-processing software. Microsoft Word didn't become a good program for a few more years.
Before Wordstar went the way of the ditto machine, they briefly offered two new versions. One was Wordstar 2000, that number reflecting the number of years it would have taken you to learn how to write a grocery list on it. The other was the exact opposite. That otter I mentioned would have loved Wordstar Easy which utterly lived up to its name. I briefly had an assistant who had never touched a computer before and I had her typing up things for me in Wordstar Easy within twenty minutes.
It output clean files which I could then load into the basic Wordstar program if I needed fancy formatting. I actually think there would be a market for something that simple which only handled movie screenplays or only handled comic book scripts and didn't also want to rearrange your closets, rotate your tires and trim your sideburns.