A Brief History of ClarisWorks 60
An anonymous user writes, "Bob Hearn, one of the original authors of ClarisWorks, has just updated his own account of the project.
It contains lots of interesting lessons for aspiring programmers."
news: gotcha
GobeProductive (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:GobeProductive (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:GobeProductive (Score:5, Informative)
Re:GobeProductive (Score:3, Informative)
Re:GobeProductive (Score:1)
Re:GobeProductive (Score:4, Insightful)
And Apple *MUST* use the Gobe Productive code base. Why? Because they had the chance to do it a second time!!!.... meaning, a chance to avoid the pitfalls in their first attempt when they were young. A chance to refine their approach, a chance to undo their mistakes. This is something that rarely, *If ever* happens!
And whatz more, they are passionate about it.
If anyone can, they can do it for the Mac - deliver a MS-Office Killer, The Killer App, that Mac MUST HAVE!
Go Apple. Grab them!!!
Re:GobeProductive (Score:3, Insightful)
Awesome Program (Score:5, Interesting)
The spreadsheet is not as nice as Excel, but it's adequate for most people's needs. The database is lame, I'll admit. But the drawing tools are awesome. And the whole thing is object-oriented and integrated, just like the article says. Want a text box in your draw document? You have the full power of the word processor. Want a spreadsheet in your word processing document? You have the full spreadsheet right there.
It's a shame that the product seems to be languishing in Version 6. I hope that we see a Version 7 soon. The product still has so much potential.
Re:Awesome Program (Score:5, Insightful)
I spent my money thinking I'd get something good but ended up having to splurge the money for Office. Office has a slightly quirky interface - sort of a half XP half OSX. But it is still much more aesthetically pleasing than a quick Carbon port.
Re:Awesome Program (Score:2, Insightful)
One more reason AW should come out new & strong now (but not sooner) is that the MS-contract is up...
The Other 'Works' (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, there is AppleWorks on the Mac, and Microsoft Works on the PC. All the others are gone.
I got Works 2.0 for Windows to go with my first PC back in 1992, and it did sterling service for me until I upgraded to Windows 95, when I rashly decided to migrate to Office. I've seriously considered going back to MS Works again, simply because it would mean one less piece of software to keep patching!
I think it's telling that the core of MS Works hasn't seen that much change in the last couple of versions, a sign that it doesn't have to worry about competition.
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, it's more the case that everyone has heard of Microsoft Office, but hardly anyone has heard of Works. Apart from the odd review when they churn out the latest WorksSuite bundle (same Works, but more and newers additional bit in the box - ironically, not really integrated with one another), I've never seen it advertised anywhere.
Since Apple are no longer obliging, are there any other 'Works'-type packages out there for Windows?
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:5, Insightful)
MS Works exists primarily so that OEMs can ship a Microsoft bundle and claim "Thousands of dollars of free software! (that cost us $39)"
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:2)
Let me guess, you bought your PC from Time Computers, right?
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, it's more the case that everyone has heard of Microsoft Office, but hardly anyone has heard of Works.
That may be the case nowadays, but 'way back then', Works suites were fairly well known.
I think a big factor was that corporate users tended to standardize on Office rather than Works, because some employees needed (or thought they needed) the features not present in the Works suites. Which led to employees wanting to use the same applications at home as they were used to at work.
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:2, Informative)
Re:AppleWorks for Windows (Score:5, Informative)
Re:AppleWorks for Windows (Score:2, Informative)
Store for Education to K-12 and higher education faculty and students.
Re:AppleWorks for Windows (Score:3, Funny)
Store for Education to K-12 and higher education faculty and students.
Rats! I have to go back to school in order to qualify for a copy.
Re:AppleWorks for Windows (Score:1)
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:2)
Anyway I bet if you look at sales works is doing fine. Usage OTOH...
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:2)
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:3, Informative)
Ah, that would explain why the only entry for AppleWorks for Windows i found at amazon.co.uk was marked 'Limited Availability'...
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:3, Funny)
Eight-In-One Eight-In-One - © 1989 Spinnaker Software Corp.
While having all of the components of an "office" software suite -- word processor, outliner, database, spreadsheet, graphics, communication -- and more, including a memo pad, address book, world clock (different time zones), calendar, "do list," label maker, ASCII file utilities, command line, disk copy, format commands, and configuration options, this suite does not have the ability to integrate data between apps. Still, it goes far beyond WP/SS/DB/comm suites and has full mouse support. The calendar option does not accept the year 2000 ("00" gives an error) but does accept 19xx and years beyond 2000.
My Hyundai XT clone came with this thing.
Now, how about Prodigy from Sears, with those CGA graphics? Don't hog all 4800 Baud!
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:1)
I think it sucked. Personally, I bought Claris Works 4.0 second hand and have used it ever since. Runs beautifully with 10.2.3, albeit in Classic mode.
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:2)
ClarisWorks (even v1.0) was miles ahead of the entire competition on the Mac. Heck, it was one of the few applications that deserved the moniker "insanely great". This is one case where the market did choose the superior product.
Re:The Other 'Works' (Score:1)
BeagleWorks.. became PerfectWorks when *sniff* Beagle Bros. closed. And the original Works was, of course, AppleWorks on the Apple //e.
BSWorks :-| (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course, the most intriguing part is,
No comment about a certain third possibilty... [openoffice.org] Note that the above was revealed a week ago by J.-L. Gassée [liberation.fr], and also picked up by Mac Rumors [macrumors.com].Re:BSWorks :-| (Score:3, Interesting)
However if this happens then I'd lay very good odds that it will parallel what happened wiht Safari. Safari isn't Konquerer, but it shares some code with it. In the same way I suspect AppleWorks 7.0 or whatever they call it will share code with OpenOffice or StarOffice but won't be equivalent to it.
OpenOffice on Mac.. (Score:2)
iApps and the future of Office (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:1)
Interesting... because I play Euchre a lot on Yahoo these days, and the applet works perfectly in Safari - the only exception is that the opening window (which lets the user select a "table" comes up at slightly the wrong stize, but it is resize-able, even though no resize widget is drawn on the bottom right.
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:1)
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:5, Insightful)
I rarely use AppleWorks any more even thouh version 6 came with my iBook, because I have a pirate copy of Office X when I need to do anything advanced while I have TextEdit for doing the simple stuff. AppleWorks is also not as intuitive as ClarisWorks once was, because it seems to want the user to base everything they do on canned templates that never really seem to be what I want to do -- and with its toolbars it becoming more and more Office-like.
Oh well, the web site linked from this article is a nice read, because ClarisWorks was my key productivity app for many years and I have great respect for its developers. CW ran more responsively on my old LC475 (25 MHz 68LC040 with 8 megs of RAM) than Office X on my G4/350 with 768 megs of RAM. Go figger.
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:1)
You would likely never see an iOffice for two reasons. Firstly, Apple would like something that doesn't sound like an MS clone and secondly because MS would raise holy hell. They would probably say that it would be like if Apple were to have named Keynote iPowerPoint instead. Granted, Office seems more generic, but just take a look at Lindows.
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:3, Informative)
MS Office
StarOffice
WordPerfect Office
OpenOffice
Ability Office
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:2)
Ouch.
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:4, Interesting)
That's actually why they might do it. If they are worried about not having "Office for OSX" if MS drops MS Office then having something OSX Office would allow them to say something very similar.
You are right that this would be a tempting target for MS lawyers though. The question really is how generic the term "office" is. I don't think Windows compares as a term, given that Windows is such a trademark. Office really isn't a trademark in the same way. (As far as I know - I could be wrong)
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:3, Insightful)
Given that there is both StarOffice and OpenOffice, I *highly* doubt that M$ could ever attack Apple for releasing iOffice, AppleOffice, or whatever.
They should obviously call it iOfficeWorks... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:1)
Business people have a hard enough time believing that macs are useful. Now try getting them past no MS office for mac.
ouch.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:2, Insightful)
Only a product running on windows could appear to beat out office.
Re:iApps and the future of Office (Score:2)
Actually, the declaration of MS as a monopoly really does limit what they can get away with, because they are vulnerable to suits from third parties as well. MS has settled some of those quietly, I believe. Now the problem here is that the legally recognized monopoly at this point is *not* on office suites, but on PC-compatible operating systems. Getting the monopoly ruling of suites would certainly be doable, but I don't know that withdrawing from a market where you are legally recognized to have a monopoly could possibly be ruled as abusing the monopoly.
Maybe, but you have to remember that Powerbooks in particular are not unknown in even fairly strongly Windows shops, so if a Mac office suite could read and write whatever a Windows PC throws at it, but has some clear advantages, it would at least cause a fair amount of whining to happen.
Interesting story. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sure the same phenomena exists in the linux world, but it seems to be drowned out in all the linux hype. Maybe 10 years from now we'll be hearing some fascinating tales of trials and tribulations in the OpenSource world.
Re:Interesting story. (Score:2, Interesting)
It is indeed more interesting, however.
Re:Interesting story. (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Interesting story. (Score:1)
(I'm assuming that 'they' would be Microsoft in the above statement)
The 'innovate' part may be open to debate *grin*, but the rest of your statement certainly rings true. Ironically, MS Works and other products such as Small Business Server (we use it here at work) have played their part in that strategy. Works had a cue-card help system and a template system back in the Windows 3.x era, long before Clippy showed up. And Small Business Server 4.5 had a lot of the MMC-based management facilities that would eventually show up in Windows 2000 (not so surprising, since SBS 4.5 came out whilst Windows 2000 was still in beta).
But then, like you said, some products didn't work out - Image Composer and PhotoDraw spring immediately to mind, as does VizAct (anyone else remember that?)
ClarisWorks still the best (Score:5, Interesting)
I first used with ClarisWorks nearly 10 years ago, and was totally amazed by the fact that such a seamless integration of 6 powerful tools (text, draw, paint, spreadsheet, database and communication) had only a tiny size of just over 3MB and MS Word alone was more than 20 MB.
How the world comes to prefer the MS bloatware called Office rather than a gem like ClarisWorks is just beyond me. Now Office X takes up 400 MB on my iBook, still not properly integrated like ClarisWorks, and runs as slow as hell even with a 3 pages documents! Apple, please take this guy back and I will wipe out the MS shit in a hear beat!
Has anyone read the reader comments from his site, it brings tears to my eyes. I am particularly moved by the story that Steve Woz always sited at the back of the classroom and learnt something new when someone was teaching the kids to use ClarisWorks.
Re:ClarisWorks still the best (Score:4, Interesting)
ClarisWorks was pretty cool (Score:4, Interesting)
Bob Hearn is a Safari Fan (Score:1)