1994's WordStar 7 running on 2024's Mint Linux. My first text processor was vi , but my first word processor was WordStar , which I started using in 1981 on an Osborne 1 . It changed my world.
I'd always been a writer, but up until then, I used my prized IBM Selectric II typewriter. With WordStar, my writing speed went from 25 words per minute to 70, and I never looked back. I wasn't alone.
Hugo Award-winning science fiction writer Robert Sawyer was a huge WordStar fan , and now he's revived the iconic word processor. I don't think anyone saw this revival coming. In an unexpected twist of technological nostalgia, WordStar has been rediscovered and is making a surprising comeback on modern computers.
Originally developed by MicroPro International, WordStar was the first commercially successful word-processing software for PCs . Before it appeared, word processors were dedicated programs on special-purpose office computers. Also: 81% of workers using AI are more productive.
Here's how to implement it WordStar was quickly followed by XyWrite, EasyWriter, and a host of other programs. Most of them are now long forgotten. However, WordPerfect lives on largely in law offices, and a handful of writers have stayed loyal to WorStar.
If A&T and MicroPro had managed to port WordStar to Unix in the early 1980s, I expect I'd still be using it today. These days, I use LibreOffice and Google Docs , even though I still have the WordStar command set embedded in my fingers. While most writers .