Re: What I would like to see

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Re: What I would like to see
by Mike Petrie on Thursday 24/Jul/2003, @19:28

> > Both WordPerfect and WordStar ended up in the hands of Corel ...

> And then there was no more WordStar. Which was my point, but thank
> you for correcting my hazy recollection of the exact history

Actually that's not quite correct. Corel started on a 32-bit version of WordStar for Windows, but abandoned it when Word Perfect became available. WordStar never changed hands and is now owned by either Gores or River Deep - I don't think they're even sure of who owns it. The history, as far as it goes, is on my Web site at http://www.wordstar.org/wordstar/history/history.htm

> So, please tell us why they need a MS Word compatible wordprocessor? :-)

They don't - but they DO, most definately need to be able to view and print, and maybe edit those old MS files.

You'd be surprised at the number of people you contact me and say something along the lines of:

"My dad wrote our family history using WordStar. I don't know
which version, but I want to read those old files into Word.
Can you help me."

Once a document has been written and printed once there's no reason why, in a year's time, or maybe even ten, why someone shouldn't want to print it again. To do this you need a program that can view and print the document. Of course, if every document gets printed to Acrobat format, while that remains a standard, there's no problem - but most documents aren't printed this way.

Any word processor these days MUST support Microsoft's RTF as an absolute minimum. Being able to acurately read and convert Word 2, 6, and 9x documents would also be an imense advantage. If you acn also read - correctly - word perfect and WordStar documents you've increased your potential sales. If in addition you canthen provide a keyboard commend set that replicates Word Perfect or WordStar you've increased your possible market again!

Cheers
Mike

Related Links

·   Articles on KDE Office Suite
·   Also by Mike Petrie
·   Contact author

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