MART°N  You may get the application for free on www.macheist.com if 500.000 people download their free nano bundle. So hurry up, only 4 days left!  
(Version 3.9.0)

BRUMM  My opinion on word processors for OS X:

The last days I've tested many word processors and I found Mellel to be the best so far,

Mellel is not bloated like all the "Office" suites (Neo, OO, MS, are all to slow, ... for me Neo Office is the best of these beasts.)

and Mellel is better than:

- Nisus (Nearest competitor but Nisus doesn't support soft hyphen!, I simply cannot work without soft hyphen.),

- Mariner Write (really bad font display/spacing for many years now, only english, carbon - so it needs to be rewritten for future OSX releases, will they do that? I'm unsure.)

- Pages (Again no soft hyphen!, occasionally crashes and after a while gets very slow, ... but I exspect the next versions will be much better)

- Papyrus (very ugly, carbon, no real testdrive possible - crippled trial version, but some interesting features - I keep an eye on it)

- AbiWord (Many bugs and no updates the last 2 years, I think they don't support the Mac anymore)

- Bean (really fanstatic freeware, but based on Apples buggy text-engine. No soft hyphen! So only usable for some very short texts, best freeware I've seen for many many years - of course I keep an eye on it)

For now I will use Mellel.

The only things that I don't like are related to the interface design, for example the round beveled look of the ruler and tools section is very outdated now, a boring all-grey mix of alien spaceship ("aqua"-style) or early iTunes versions ("metal"-style).

But besides that Mellel has the best combination of features for me, so my money goes to them.   
(Version 3.8)

SJHA  I am sorry to see that the upgrade from 3.8 to 3.9 abandons support for Tiger.   
(Version 3.9.0)

ROBOTANK  Ultimately, what word processor is best comes down to personal preference and needs; there will never be a definitive end to this debate. For my needs--taking class notes and writing short and medium-length papers--Mariner Write achieves the perfect balance of features and weight. It's quick to open and respond, and its essential features for my purposes are more easily accessible and intuitive than in any other word processor I've tried. My only real complaint is something that's come up several times on this page: improper spacing of characters. With some fonts, you end up with the occasional ugly gap between letters. This is a minor issue in the end, and no software is perfect. I’ve noticed that Mellel has come up a lot on this page. It’s also a fine word processor, and contains more advance features, though Mariner Write is still more streamlined. Also, if you use Spell Catcher, Mellel will not allow automatic replacement, which can create issues with bulleted lists since Spell Catcher has to backspace to make corrections.

The only way to choose the best word processor for your use is to try what’s out there. There are good options on the Mac platform besides the huge, feature-intensive office suites (though these are still essential in some situations).  
(Version 3.8)

JRNYOFLIFE  It's a breath of fresh air, in the Mac world, to have a word processor open quickly. Mariner Write opens in one or two seconds on my MacBook 2.2Ghz. Apple's own word processor Pages takes a lot longer, and Microsoft Word 2008 seems to take forever.

The efficiencies of the program don't end there. All of the essential features are quickly accessible and well thought out. I used it to take notes tonight for a non-profit meeting and it worked very well for that.

Things I like about Mariner Write:

Open

- Option to open files from previous session

Fonts

- Hierarchical font menu, and WYSIWYG

Bullet Indent ! (woo hoo!)

Date Format

- Ability to set to many different kinds of formats -- useful.

Ruler

- Paper edge vs. printer edge.

- A full page is readable from a standard MacBook's resolution.

Files

- Can specify the number of backup copies to make. I haven't experimented with this but I think it will be a very handy feature.

File format

- Can specify RTF - Word

Thoughtful touches

- When adding buttons to the toolbar when customizing, there is an Add after and Add before. There is not a move up or move down but that hasn't been too much of a hindrance.

Keyboard shortcut for entering date..

Tables work intuitively

- Can increase a column by dragging from any point in the verticle line

- New rows added automatically when tabbing from last row

- Easy access from the editing window.

Fonts

- Floating font panel that makes it easy to choose fonts, and lets you set up font collections of your favorite fonts.

- Easy font selection at the top of the editing window

- Easy color and highlighting form the editing window

- Choosing from MANY different font styles from the font menu

- Highlighting and font color are at the top of the editing window

Editing

- Remove leading ">", handy for quote in e-mails

Graphics:

- Easy to import

- Text can wrap around a graphic!

- Easy to enlarge graphic proportionally

- Easy to insert graphic into a table cell

Save:

- Save a copy as

Print Envelope

- VERY EASY, DEDICATED FUNCTION FOR THAT

Speak!

- Selection

- All

- Good voice

Insert Rule to separate items is intuitive

Font, Size, and Style all get their own menus which makes it a snap to easily change something.

- Click the font menu then start typing the letters of the font name and you go right to it.

- Click size menu and select size or if you want 18 point just click 1 and 8 then enter

- Click the style menu and select "strike through" or just type s and t, it hightlights then hit enter

To sum it up, it's a word processor that opens fast, that is easy to use, that has all the most used features right there. There may be a rare instance in which I would want to use MS Word over this program but this is my word processor of choice for the vast majority of documents I will be creating.

(and note: I am a power user; in this program the power is the speed, and quick access to the main features usually used)  
(Version 3.7.2)

CROBERTS  This program is at best vaporware and at worst dead. Long promised new version keeps getting pushed onto the back burner. What's really galling is that right before Mariner stopped active development they promoted "lifetime upgrade" program for which they got a bunch of extra money. Shame.  
(Version 3.8)

M-RICK  could be good but doesn't support right to left languages such as arabic and hebrew.  
(Version 3.8)

GENERAL  Since I completely moved to Mac I've been trying to find word processor that will work as smooth as MS Word does in Windows. Right now, I'm still juggling between Mellel (quick and usable, but ugly to my taste) and Nisus (some text rendering problems).

But Mariner has been the biggest disappointment by far - apart from looking so ugly (toolbars from OS 9?!) It doesn't even support standard OS way for switching keyboards. C'mon. And all of this before you type first words and realise that it can't properly render text. As I said Nisus has it's quirks, but Mariner doesn't look like Aqua application.

Does anyone checks for reviews that are posted on MacUpdate?  
(Version 3.7.2)

ANONYMOUS  Not very good software and an unethical company. They tried to take the Mellel domain away, and are stuck in Carbon. Buy software for the rest of the people who deserve better than Mariner can provide.  
(Version 3.6.5)

MARKUS WINTER  You seem to get it for free even if less than 500 000 people sign up - I got the serial already  
(Version 3.9.0)