Writing in the cloud: A free solution for long manuscripts.

I've spent a lot of time between the 2015 holidays and my return from China exploring free alternatives to tools I need to write.

Here is a summary. Perhaps the time I spent will save you some.

What I Needed

1. A word processor 
2. A hierarchical outliner
3. Cloud storage.

Requirements

1. Must work under Windows and Linux (because I do; Wine or VMs a last resort).
2. Must be free or open source, actively developed, preferably with a friendly and helpful community.
3. Word processor must have a document navigator and elegantly handle long documents with many chapter headers and comments, a handful of styles, tables and images, and uncomplicated formatting.
4. Outliner must support Rich Text and image embedding. (Eg, must act like a word processor.)

What I've Tried
Nearly everything you'll find here:

1. Alternatives to MS Office       
2. Alternatives to OneNote
3. Alternatives to Google Drive

What I Decided to Use

1. Kingsoft WPS Office
2. CherryTree Outliner
3. DropBox 

Why I Didn't Choose Some Obvious Contenders

1. Microsoft Word
   • I  have a one-year free subscription (full installation and Office 365, came with a laptop). But that's not free. That's a carrot. The last thing I need is to become so dependent on an app that I'm forced to pay for it to continue writing.
   • Word is sluggish with long manuscripts, even on new computers with lots of memory. I can't believe everyone else is experiencing this, but Word 2016 just can't keep up.
   • No native Linux client, of course.
   
2. OpenOffice/LibreOffice
   • Big problem: Not 100% compatible with Word. Found out the hard way when I used it to renew a travel visa (involved disappearing images).
   • Small problem (but a deal killer): Try this - create a long Writer document in LibreOffice. Scroll down to some random location. Make an edit. Scroll down some more (don't PgDn or use the down arrow). Now save. What happens? You're bounced back up to where you left your cursor. Now imagine jumping around a 300-page manuscript and finding yourself hopelessly lost between where you were and where you were before that.
   
3. SoftMaker FreeOffice
   • I really like this suite. It's a smart, lean alternative to MS out of Germany, and despite a few issues, I almost paid for it. I'd been watching prices of Softmaker and WPS and waited for a sale. As soon as Softmaker went on sale, I planned to buy it. On the last day of the sale, I visited the site to buy, and... the price had gone up $10. Sorry, Softmaker. I know these things are often controlled by algorithms, but you lost the sale and a customer.
   
4. Calligra Suite
   • I'm excited about this suite because it includes a database module, Kexi, but the word processor is still in its infancy. Hope to see something to test drive down the road.
   
5. Google Drive / Google Docs
   • Google's spell checker has no equal. I use Docs all the time just for final spell checking short documents, but it's not for longer manuscripts (yet) and document navigation is rudimentary.
   • No native Linux client. Of course, you can use Google Drive and Docs through the browser, but there's no installable client for Drive, and apparently no interest from Google in creating one.
   • Google Drive app routinely stops responding on Windows 10. (Wonder why.)
   
6. OneNote
   • OneNote is a very nice outliner/notetaker from Microsoft, and it's 100% free. But it's so integrated into OneDrive, unless I'm committed to OneDrive, OneNote is not the best answer,
   • No Linux support, of course.       

Final World

• I can pirate nearly anything I feel like looking for. I didn't want to.
• Free is sometimes better than what you pay for. You just have to spend a little time looking and learning. 
• Sometimes (not always, but sometimes), those who give things away care more than those who sell them. And that doesn't just go for software. That goes for things like the News from Lake Wobegon, too, and 4th of July fireworks, and good conversations and soup kitchens and wafers and those little cups of wine Donald Trump knows so much about.

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