Yes, lots of professional writers (of books, especially) use Microsoft Word for their writing. In many cases their editors require them to do so.

If you're writing a 100,000 word novel, a single text file in a text editor isn't really the optimal solution (although yes it's probably still better than using Word).

If you're writing a 100 000-page novel, it doesn't matter what you do, you're not going to succeed. :)

I'm guessing you mean 100 000 words? What do you think is the optimal solution? I'd think a text file in Emacs outline-mode would be about right, although of course Word seems to work pretty well too.

I don't know what kind of books you're writing, but 100,000 pages is too many pages. Did you mean 100,000 words?

I've only ever written 50,000 word NaNoWriMo stuff, but I've had a lot of success with text files, simply marked-up, in emacs. One text file per chapter. A short Python script converts them into LaTeX and a makefile builds a PDF. All the notes are handled with org-mode. It's a really sweet setup.

typo - fixed :)

as for LateX/python stuff - the article is addressing the needs of the average writer, of which those who know anything resembling python are a small small subset.

> a single text file in a text editor isn't really the optimal solution

Why not? And if not, a folder with one file per chapter along with unix tools to work on them sounds ideal to me.

You can use e.g. LaTeX and its `include' or `input' commands to organize your document into different files.

That really doesn't address the need the article is speaking to -- the need for a writing program for the average writer that addresses writing concerns rather than formatting concerns.

Yes, that's true. Though some Emacs mode could go a long way to help you with writing concerns (and may or may not employ LaTeX somewhere).