Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!emory!phssra
From: phssra@mathcs.emory.edu (Scott R. Anderson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Software Authors please note.
Summary: Free Nelson MacWrite!
Message-ID: <5084@emory.mathcs.emory.edu>
Date: 3 Mar 90 12:56:48 GMT
References: <7257@ll1a.att.com> <10883@claris.com> <6515@arisia.Xerox.COM> <10884@claris.com>
Reply-To: phssra@emory.UUCP (Scott Robert Anderson)
Organization: Department of Physics, Emory University, Atlanta
Lines: 36

In article <10884@claris.com> drc@claris.com (Dennis Cohen) writes:
>ebert@arisia.Xerox.COM (Robert Ebert) writes:
>>Apple stopped distributing MacWrite and MacPaint with new
>>Macintoshes a couple of years ago.
>
>The first correction that I would like to make to the above is that Claris
>no longer makes or sells MacWrite, we make and sell MacWrite II which is
>a completely different package from the ground (file-format) up.  The
>point about MacWrite format is that every word-processor for the Mac
>reads that format and it has been the "lingua franca" for documentation
>on the Mac from the beginning.
>
>TeachText will not work for people who are still running System 3.2 (you
>know, those folks with 512K old-ROM machines or with 512Ke machines that
>want to have enough RAM left to run an application)  the original MacWrite
>format fulfills that need.

Well, then, I have a suggestion, since Claris no longer makes or sells
MacWrite: release it into the public domain.  Then it can continue to be the
Lingua Franca of the Macintosh, and if people need more power, they can buy
more powerful word processors like MacWrite II or Word.  As time marches on,
the original MacWrite becomes less and less of a threat to these feature-full
applications, so why not make it available again?  Otherwise, "MacWrite Format"
will cease to have any meaning to Mac users.

I always thought that Apple made a big mistake when they stopped distributing
MacWrite.  A year later they saw the error of their ways and introduced
TeachText, but the latter is not quite flexible enough.  Paste PICTS with
ResEdit?  So much for the famous Macintosh human interface!  Documenters are
human, too, you know :-).

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  *      **                  Scott Robert Anderson      gatech!emoryu1!phssra
   *   *    *    **          phssra@unix.cc.emory.edu   phssra@emoryu1.bitnet
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