Most of the home pages for these writing tools are missing the most important thing: a full screenshot of the app! Why all the tiny crops, screencasts, and written descriptions?
>I love InDesign and if you want to make documents look really good this is the tool you need, that said, don’t write in it just copy and paste.
LaTeX + Emacs does a decent job in coordination with Inkscape for images. It's a little bit of a technical solution, but InDesign doesn't exactly have an easy learning curve.
I've also thrown Scribus at some of the users on my network in lieu of shelling out for an InDesign license and they seem to be enjoying it pretty well. In a lot of ways Scribus seems like a good, user-friendly editor, sort of the Inkscape to InDesign's Illustrator.
His hatred of Word seems odd. It can do exactly what other programs he likes does, but can also do a lot more. If you like typing without distractions, it can do that. If you need some minimal formatting features, it has you covered. If you need the full power of Word, well, there you go.
I would suggest that it does those things, but not as well, not by default, and for a lot more money than many other options. That said, if it works for you, go for it. It certainly gets the job done.
Actually, having used it, I enjoy the way they handle full screen mode. It handles it extremely well. By default it doesn't load up into that mode, but it's one button click to get to that mode.
I'm not suggesting that Word is for everyone. Rather, to dismiss Word is silly. It does a lot, it does a lot really, really well, and while it costs more than the other options in the list, it's only because you are buying other applications alongside it.
Word for Mac has improved a lot in the last years. They are getting closer and closer to really fitting the Mac. It has finally become at least somewhat hard to find places where Word is still decidedly no fitting the platform. (One example would be that they still litter the Applications folder with crap.)
I really recommend anyone to give the newest version of Office a shot.
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In fact, TextEdit is far more powerful than some people think. Read this post at MinimalMac for some insights:
http://minimalmac.com/post/150121510/textedit-heres-the-thin...
LaTeX + Emacs does a decent job in coordination with Inkscape for images. It's a little bit of a technical solution, but InDesign doesn't exactly have an easy learning curve.
I've also thrown Scribus at some of the users on my network in lieu of shelling out for an InDesign license and they seem to be enjoying it pretty well. In a lot of ways Scribus seems like a good, user-friendly editor, sort of the Inkscape to InDesign's Illustrator.
Here's a screenshot of the minimal full screen with minor formatting features, for example: http://sircram.wordpress.com/2010/09/27/word-for-mac-2011-fu...
The best part is, the toolbar at the top hides away, and the background color can be changed to different hi-res textures.
I'm not suggesting that Word is for everyone. Rather, to dismiss Word is silly. It does a lot, it does a lot really, really well, and while it costs more than the other options in the list, it's only because you are buying other applications alongside it.
I really recommend anyone to give the newest version of Office a shot.