LosOjos Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 BBC News - Game of Thrones author George RR Martin: 'Why I still use DOS' Does he really know nobody who could have turned all that carp off for him in Word?
synaesthesia Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 He's a loon. Nothing however is worse than the BBC's ruddy writing though. To quote from that very article "Disk operating system computers were popular in the 1980s and early 1990s." Yeah, that's right. Popular. "Operating System" computers are still, er, rather popular now....
Norphy Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 To each their own. If that's how he prefers to write, more power to him. Some authors still write by hand. Some use typewriters. He likes to use an old fashioned word processor. So what?
tmcd35 Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 I don't know. I can kind of understand it. There's a certain charm/ease to WordPerfect 5 on DOS (I know he uses WordStar - never used that myself). If your writing a 1000 page fantasy manuscript perhaps it better to K.I.S.S.?
Roberto Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 wordstar was forged by lucifer himself. But if a successful scriptwriter finds that it helps them be successful then who are we to argue.
abillybob Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 Everyone has their own opinions and preferences I say all the good for it! I can see where he is coming from he likes the old-style feel when he is writing a novel, I suppose new Office and Windows bring on a whole load of distractions when typing, the bright fancy colours, effects, ribbon bars. He doesn't want that I suppose just a plain old typer where he can do his typing no shame in that
Bananas Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 Plus boot time, there's nothing quite as fun as listening to the click of 4MB of RAM being tested before watching config.sys and autoexec.bat running through their commands along with the "fun" of jiggling things around into Himem to get as much of that precious 640KB free as possible Fun times
rich_tech Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 Surely that stuff could just be turned off ? Understand the virus bit though, thats a worry ill wager and I cant see it being trusted to "Ze Cloud"
Arthur Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 What about something more modern like Vim with the XMonad WM in Linux?
LosOjos Posted May 15, 2014 Author Posted May 15, 2014 My comment RE Word was meant to be tongue-in-cheek BTW... Funny that the BBC fail to mention Microsoft once in an article about DOS yet they manage to drop Apple in to just about anything even remotely related!
LeMarchand Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 I'd heard this before, and wondered if it's why it takes him so damn long to write each part of ASOIAF. On a more serious note, all of his concerns could be easily addressed with a minimum of effort on a modern machine that would be a lot less likely to die on him. I'm sure he could get a fan to do it for free!
SiliconAlley_Sam Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 I wish he'd stop giving these interviews and focus on writing the next damn book! I neeeed to know what happens next.
synaesthesia Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 Lot of folks rather missing the point. It's like taking the bus to work because you can't figure out how to change the radio station on your car stereo... (PS. He's still a loon. Not a fan of his books at all!)
LosOjos Posted May 15, 2014 Author Posted May 15, 2014 I do wonder how he gets on with his publishers: they can be extremely specific about the required formatting of submitted works...
localzuk Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 I wish he'd stop giving these interviews and focus on writing the next damn book! I neeeed to know what happens next. I'll summarise it for you: A bunch of people get killed, there's a bunch of sex, and some dragons.
SiliconAlley_Sam Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 I'll summarise it for you: A bunch of people get killed, there's a bunch of sex, and some dragons. Spoiler alert!
LeightonJames Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 I do wonder how he gets on with his publishers: they can be extremely specific about the required formatting of submitted works... I expect the final file is provided to them in a format they can use, besides I'm sure he could give the next manuscript to his publishers on red strawberry scented paper written in comic sans and they would still take it and publish it.
LosOjos Posted May 15, 2014 Author Posted May 15, 2014 I expect the final file is provided to them in a format they can use, besides I'm sure he could give the next manuscript to his publishers on red strawberry scented paper written in comic sans and they would still take it and publish it. Haha yeah you do have a lot more freedom when you're making money. I meant more the actual formatting, they can be very specific about line height, letter spacing, formatting symbols etc. Must be a nightmare in Wordstar! Then again, maybe he just submits as is and lets them deal with it.
LeMarchand Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 (edited) I do wonder how he gets on with his publishers: they can be extremely specific about the required formatting of submitted works... He has (? see below) an assistant; maybe part of their job is to retype it all - job that could probably be done automatically on a decent machine! Mind you, GRRM would probably insist on checking it. No wonder he takes so long! (Or he makes Harper Collins so much moolah that they forgive his eccentricities!) I did hear his assistant was now working on something else (advisor on a new GoT game?) so don't expect the next book in any sort of hurry. (PS. He's still a loon. Not a fan of his books at all!) Whilst I'll admit that the last 2 ASOIAF books have been lacking, they're the only two books of his that I've read and not thoroughly enjoyed - and I've read pretty much all of them except the collaborations/"edited by" collections. Had to do some work(!) so above 2 replies not there when I started typing. Edited May 15, 2014 by LeMarchand Interrupted
tmcd35 Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 He needs to move to wordpad on windows 7 Too much hassle trying to get that yellow text on a blue background
CyberDrac Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 He would use Windows, but every time he sees one he tries to push a character out of it ...
SiliconAlley_Sam Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 He would use Windows, but every time he sees one he tries to push a character out of it ... Hehehe!
SYNACK Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 What about something more modern like Vim with the XMonad WM in Linux? Yea, that is designed by nutbar academics for nutbar academics and so would probably be perfect. There is a basis as a modern os that can do anything allows you to goof off in seconds where as a dos wordstar box is far less easy. You would probably be able to write easier with less discipline required on such a system When I write I barely look at the screen, maybe once a sentence or so with the rest of the time stareing through the keyboard and visualising what I am writing about. To be fair I'm not an award winning author and my brain probably works very differently.
CHR1S Posted May 15, 2014 Posted May 15, 2014 Please tell me he does not print it to an old dot matrix printer then make his lackey re-type it all onto Word?
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