SJHA  Bean has made it possible for me finally to accept the loss of WriteNow! A brilliant programme - congratulations to the developer.  
(Version 2.3)

MWSCHMEER  Simply one of the best styled word processors for the Mac. Sure, it doesn't have all the bells and whistles of Nisus Express or even iText Express, but then, how often do you really need all the bells and whistles?

This is the right tool for writing 95% of the time if you are not in school writing documented research papers. And even then, you could probably crib along OK.

I'm sure I'm not alone when I say that this is simply one of the best free pieces of software out there. It is one of the first apps I install on any Mac I use; I even carry it around on a thumb drive for when I am away from my home Mac (note to developer: might want to make an option to save/use the preference file from a local directory).  
(Version 2.2)

MAC66GRAPHICS  Very buggy on an Intel Mac Pro Desktop. Image disappeared when pasted from one page to another. Then Text disappeared when opening window on desktop. I would like to use this for at least note information from www pages, but will have to wait until the bugs are fixed. I LOVE Swift Publishing for mini word processor, followed by Apples Pages.  
(Version 2.2)

KRIS  I just installed Bean and I want to leave text edit behind. Bena is so user friendly!  
(Version 2.1)

REPEATER75  I started using Bean before the 2.0 betas and thought it was a good Text Edit replacement but as of 2.1 I'm using it instead of Word about 75% of the time. Let me tell you, if you get tired of waiting on Word 2008 to load, look no further than Bean. Unless you have complex layout needs, this little gem is a joy to use and runs lightly on the resources. Thanks very much to the dev for this great tool.  
(Version 2.1)

ELEMENTNINETY3  I had MS Office on my 13" MacBook before the hard drive failed (shame, really). I've had to use TextEdit since then, and have on many occasions thought about using a free word processor instead, but decided against it because I didn't think there were any good ones out there that would do much more than TextEdit.

Clearly, I was wrong.

Bean has completely changed my view of things, and I would never go back to MS Word now. I just love the interface, the Inspector, and the freedom it gives me. Five stars for sure.

Dev: If you could make a spreadsheet app to go with Bean, I'd grab it in a heartbeat. The only thing I miss about Office now is Excel. Ah well, I suppose...  
(Version 2.1)

FREE_DEVELOPMENT  I love this app and use it every day. I have one problem though. Whenever I try to insert a photo, nothing shows up, and sometimes makes other things disappear. I've tried dragging and dropping, as well as going to edit>insert>picture. Please help  
(Version 2.0.4b)

KRIONI  Whoa!

Powdered Bean is correct about what happens. To replicate this bug, do the following:

1. Open some document with a bunch of text.

2. Highlight some of that text (try a line or two). Note what text FOLLOWS the text you highlighted.

3. Open the Find/Replace dialog by pressing command-F.

4. In the Find: field type in the first word of what is highlighted.

5. In the Replace with: field type in XXXXX

6. Hit Replace.

What gets replaced is NOT just what matches the "Find" text. Instead, the entire highlighted text is gone, replaced by XXXXX (in my example here).

Interestingly, this is what happens in TextEdit as well. The problem is not with Bean. In fact, theoretically, this is what SHOULD happen. Reason? The Replace button is supposed to replace the currently highlighted text. The button is NOT Find-and-Replace, it is merely Replace. A 'Replace All' on the other hand, is designed to Find-and-Replace all occurrences.

So, what Powdered Bean discovered is NOT a bug, but a somewhat confusing feature common to most editors. Certainly to editors that use Apple's text engine.  
(Version 2.0.4b)

POWDERED BEAN 2  Hello JNRH,

I'm sorry, but Bean doesn't act like TexEdit in this situation.

In Apples TextEdit, if you have some text selected and do a search & replace, the selection is ignored and instead the whole text gets edited, but in Bean the whole selected text gets deleted, no search & replace, Bean simply deletes the selected text!

That's the difference, TextEdit just ignores the selection and searches & replaces in the whole document, - but Bean _deletes_ the text selection (means: the selected text isn't there anymore, no search & replace in the whole text like in TexEdit, Bean _deletes_ the selected text.)

What is that good for?

Yes I can undo Bean's behaviour, but what's the reason for deleting the selected text in that situation? If I want to delete some selected text, I usually use the delete command - I don't expect that "function" in search & replace...

Well, maybe my english is to bad to make clear were I see the problem.

Anyway, thanks for your reply.

Mac OS 10.4.11, PPC  
(Version 2.0.4b)

POWDERED BEAN 2  Hello HAMPST,

many thanks for your tip, that works, but nonetheless it is a svere bug.

In Apples TextEdit, if you have some text selected and do a search & replace, the selection is ignored and the whole text gets changed (also not a very Mac-like behavior, I think), - but nothing will be lost like in Bean.

If it is somehow against Apples legendary logic of usability to search just inside the selection if the user has made a selection, then this kind of logic at least should not lead to data loss in any application, wether it is based on Apples Textkit or not.

I'm sure not everyone knows the trick you mentioned here and therefore Bean should not behave like that.

Unwanted deletion of data is a very critical thing.

Besides that Bean is a great app.

My big thanks to the developer.

Merry christmas to all.  
(Version 2.0.3b)