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Newbie - Need word count in TextEdit

J

JolieCat

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Hello. When I switched from PC to iMac I no longer have MS Word (and no money to get it) so I've been working in TextEdit.

It does not have a word count feature, which I desperately need. How do I count words in TE?

Also, while I have you --

- Why does my mouse not scroll down, only up? I googled and found all the mouse cleaning tips, but this is a brand new mouse and there's no gunk inside to clean.

-- Why doesn't the Zoom In feature stay zoomed in? I have a bigger monitor than I've ever had, and the smallest type I've ever seen. I've done the whole Preferences thing, set the type to 24. Web sites are practically unreadable until I zoom two or three times every time I visit them.

- The monitor is very, very bright. I'm losing my eyesight between tiny type and staring at this sun of a monitor.

-- Any recommendations on an affordable laser printer (NO inkjet please) that will work well with Mac. My HP1020 is now a doorstop due to incompatibility with Mac.

-- Any way to have my calendar show up when I first sign in? This isn't a biggie but it would be nice.

Thank you very much.

Jolie

oops, sorry, one more:

--Why is there no right/left click on the mouse? I squeeze the buttons on the side but nothing happens.

Thanks.
 
Firstly you can just use any PC mouse and don't have to use the ****** mighty mouse which will fix your scrolling issue. But you right click by pressing on the right side of the mouse and lifting your finger off the left.

Secondly you can turn down the brightness with the small/big Sun buttons on the keyboard - or in System Preferences>Display.

In System Preferences>Display you can also change the resolution to make stuff bigger on the screen.

For Word Count you'll need to get a copy of iWork 09 or MS Office 2008 for home and student.

EDIT: See above - there is an Intel version of NanoCount available from http://paulgorman.org/software/NanoCount/

For the printer take a look at: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/774965/
 
There are plenty of ok text editors available for free.
Openoffice and neooffice are two that people often recommend on these forums
 
Change monitor brightness:
System Preferences / Displays (or use the keyboard short cut)

Right click on calendar on the dock to select
"open at login"

Mouse: go into
System Preferences and the the thing that makes sense. You might have to enable right click / secondary click.
 
Tiki35 said:
http://memex.naughtons.org/archives/2008/02/03/4784
What kind of mouse? Go to the manufacturer's website and download the driver for the mac.
Go into Displays in System Preferences and turn the brightness down.
To have iCal start at login, go into System Preferences, Accounts, Login Items tab, click the plus sign, go to your applications folder and find ICal.
Regarding your printer:
http://www.wikihow.com/Install-Drivers-for-the-HP-Laserjet-1020-on-Mac-OS-X
Click to expand...

Thank you Tiki. I did the brightness thing. MUCH better. My corneas have stopped hurting. 😛

I added ICal to open at login. It should work. I'll find out when I shut down and come back again.

Not sure about the printer driver. I have Snow Leopard.

Eraserhead said:
Firstly you can just use any PC mouse and don't have to use the ****** mighty mouse which will fix your scrolling issue. But you right click by pressing on the right side of the mouse and lifting your finger off the left.

Secondly you can turn down the brightness with the small/big Sun buttons on the keyboard - or in System Preferences>Display.

In System Preferences>Display you can also change the resolution to make stuff bigger on the screen.

For Word Count you'll need to get a copy of iWork 09 or MS Office 2008 for home and student.

EDIT: See above - there is an Intel version of NanoCount available from http://paulgorman.org/software/NanoCount/

For the printer take a look at: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/774965/
Click to expand...

Eraserhead, thank you. Fixed the brightness. As for changing the resolution, it's set at 1680x1050, the highest. Should I make that smaller?

I downloaded NanoCount, but how do I get it to work with TextEdit? Is it automatic? How do I launch it?

Eraserhead said:
Firstly you can just use any PC mouse and don't have to use the ****** mighty mouse which will fix your scrolling issue. But you right click by pressing on the right side of the mouse and lifting your finger off the left.

Secondly you can turn down the brightness with the small/big Sun buttons on the keyboard - or in System Preferences>Display.

In System Preferences>Display you can also change the resolution to make stuff bigger on the screen.

For Word Count you'll need to get a copy of iWork 09 or MS Office 2008 for home and student.

EDIT: See above - there is an Intel version of NanoCount available from http://paulgorman.org/software/NanoCount/

For the printer take a look at: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/774965/
Click to expand...

cluthz said:
There are plenty of ok text editors available for free.
Openoffice and neooffice are two that people often recommend on these forums
Click to expand...

I love openoffice! Does it work with Mac? I've heard mixed reviews on NeoOffice but I guess I could try it. It can't be worse than TextEdit

Consultant said:
Change monitor brightness:
System Preferences / Displays (or use the keyboard short cut)

Right click on calendar on the dock to select
"open at login"

Mouse: go into
System Preferences and the the thing that makes sense. You might have to enable right click / secondary click.
Click to expand...

Thank you Consultant. I did go into the Mouse on System Preferences. Some things were turned off. I did enable the right click/secondary click and now that's working. But at both 360-degree setting and vertical setting, the mouse still doesn't scroll down, only up. Maybe I'll just go back to my old PC Mouse from my old computer, unless there's something ultra-special about the Mighty Mouse I haven't discovered yet (it WAS my favorite cartoon character at one time).

Jo
 
JolieCat said:
-- Why doesn't the Zoom In feature stay zoomed in? I have a bigger monitor than I've ever had, and the smallest type I've ever seen. I've done the whole Preferences thing, set the type to 24. Web sites are practically unreadable until I zoom two or three times every time I visit them.
Click to expand...
The new iMacs have very high resolutions so many things are smaller on it but there are things that can be adjusted. For websites you can set the smallest text sizes to a larger size in the preference section. If you are using Safari then go into the Advanced settings in Preference and select "never use font size smaller than..." and experiment with the sizes to see what works best for you. You do need to realize that you are artificially increasing the font sizes so websites might look a little weird because everything usually won't increase along with the font. The websites will be easier to read though. If you are using another web browser like Firefox it's pretty much the same process to increase the fonts.

The other things you can do also are increasing the dock size and in Finder you can increase your folder icon size and font text sizes too. Not every application will allow you to increase the size so a high resolution can be annoying at times.

JolieCat said:
I love openoffice! Does it work with Mac? I've heard mixed reviews on NeoOffice but I guess I could try it. It can't be worse than TextEdit
Click to expand...
OpenOffice is available for Mac. NeoOffice is almost the same thing. Basically it's another version of OpenOffice so they operate very similar. They are both free so it's best to just download both and try them out for yourself. I have both installed myself. They both have word count by the way. 😉 You can also increase the zoom in both applications.

JolieCat said:
Thank you Consultant. I did go into the Mouse on System Preferences. Some things were turned off. I did enable the right click/secondary click and now that's working. But at both 360-degree setting and vertical setting, the mouse still doesn't scroll down, only up. Maybe I'll just go back to my old PC Mouse from my old computer, unless there's something ultra-special about the Mighty Mouse I haven't discovered yet (it WAS my favorite cartoon character at one time).
Click to expand...
Just use any USB mouse that works for you. I myself have a basic two button Logitech mouse with scroll wheel. It works great. Just keep in mind that the fancier the features your mouse has the more likely it will need proper drivers to make them work. A basic mouse will work on just about any computer whether it's Mac or Windows. I do prefer an optical mouse because I hate all the cleaning you have to do with a ball mouse.
 
As for the mouse did you try the cleaning it by rolling the ball upside down on a piece of clean paper? you have go all out to get it clean sometimes 😛.

For your word count problem just download OpenOffice. As you said it's great and free. I feel sorry for you that you've been using text edit.
 
tallguy said:
As for the mouse did you try the cleaning it by rolling the ball upside down on a piece of clean paper? you have go all out to get it clean sometimes 😛.

For your word count problem just download OpenOffice. As you said it's great and free. I feel sorry for you that you've been using text edit.
Click to expand...

Tallguy, I downloaded Open Office and have been using it just fine. I can't believe I just believed my idiot friend who said you can't use OO with Mac. Maybe it was true at one time but I've been using it and loving it. That TextEdit was terrible.

I did the paper thing with the mouse. Still no go. I think I'll just get a plain old mouse and forget this fancy Mighty Mouse. It's not so mighty. :-(

Thanks!

Jo
 
JolieCat said:
I can't believe I just believed my idiot friend who said you can't use OO with Mac. Maybe it was true at one time but I've been using it and loving it.
Click to expand...
The earlier versions of OpenOffice didn't really work that great on Macs and you had to install extra software to make it work. That's why NeoOffice was so popular before OpenOffice started working on Macs better. NeoOffice is the other Mac version of OpenOffice.

Now if we can just get every Windows user to start using OpenOffice then there will be no compatibility issues going back and forth between Mac and Windows. 😉
 
JolieCat said:
Thank you Consultant. I did go into the Mouse on System Preferences. Some things were turned off. I did enable the right click/secondary click and now that's working. But at both 360-degree setting and vertical setting, the mouse still doesn't scroll down, only up. Maybe I'll just go back to my old PC Mouse from my old computer, unless there's something ultra-special about the Mighty Mouse I haven't discovered yet (it WAS my favorite cartoon character at one time).

Jo
Click to expand...


The mighty mouse's scroll ball can get dirty and stop working in one direction or another. Unplug the mouse, hold it upside down, and rub the scroll ball on a clean sheet of printer paper or something similar. Don't apply much more pressure than you normally do while regularly using the mouse because the spring inside can break.

It might take a couple cleanings using this method if you notice a lot of black gunk on the paper.
 
madog said:
The mighty mouse's scroll ball can get dirty and stop working in one direction or another. Unplug the mouse, hold it upside down, and rub the scroll ball on a clean sheet of printer paper or something similar. Don't apply much more pressure than you normally do while regularly using the mouse because the spring inside can break.

It might take a couple cleanings using this method if you notice a lot of black gunk on the paper.
Click to expand...

I've done that twice already. Nothing. There's no gunk anywhere. It just doesn't work. It's easier to replace something like this than spend any more time trying to get it to work. I have a couple mice (meeses?) around here so it's just unplug, plug in, and I'm done.

Does anybody have the new $70 mouse? I'm curious if it's worth it.

Jolie
 
JolieCat said:
Hello. When I switched from PC to iMac I no longer have MS Word (and no money to get it) so I've been working in TextEdit.
Click to expand...

If you're saving your stuff as .txt (standard text) files, open up Terminal, type "wc " (with the space after "wc"), drag the file to the Terminal window, then press enter. the wc command prints the number of lines, number of words, and the byte count.

-- Any recommendations on an affordable laser printer (NO inkjet please) that will work well with Mac. My HP1020 is now a doorstop due to incompatibility with Mac.
Click to expand...

I have used the Brother HL series for a while now. For example, the Brother HL-2140 is $80 on amazon at the moment. They're very reliable and the included toner cartridge lasts a long time.
 
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miles01110 said:
I have used the Brother HL series for a while now. For example, the Brother HL-2140 is $80 on amazon at the moment. They're very reliable and the included toner cartridge lasts a long time.
Click to expand...

Miles, thanks so much for the printer recommendation. $80 is certainly reasonable, especially with a long lasting cartridge.

Jo
 
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TextEdit isn't terrible, it's just not meant for what you were using it for. Like saying my DVD player is terrible, it doesn't play Blu Ray.
 
TextEdit must be one of the handiest apps on my Mac.
Opens and saves to .doc plus several other formats.

Send any selection of text into TextEdit via services.

If you need word count etc:
http://www.supermagnus.com/mac/Word_Counter/index.html

My mighty mouse has been in use for a couple of years both by me and my husband without any problems. A quick trip into Apple might be best if it will not work the way it should. Love the 360º scroll 🙂
 
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