[tylero]

I've seen at least as many technical authors get distracted by the intricacies of LaTeX or DocBook as those trying to "design" in Word or OpenOffice. Using markup doesn't prevent the problem of diverting authorial attention to design. Every composition tool can be abused.

Word and OpenOffice can be used intelligently, if you avoid the design-as-you-write trap. I've never really seen a diffing tool (for prose, mind you) with the readability of a word processor's 'redline' or trackchanges feature. Anyone have recommendations on that front?