Editor’s Note
The following timeline accompanies the main articles, “Origin of Word
Processing Software for Personal Computers: 1976-1985” and
“Proliferation and Consolidation of Word Processing Software: 1985-1995”
by Thomas J. (Tim) Bergin, which appear in the October-December 2006
issue of IEEE Annals of the History of Computing. The timeline was omitted from the articles because of space constraints.
Year | Event |
| 1960 | J.C.R. Licklider, “Man-Computer Symbiosis,” published in IRE Trans. on Human Factors in Electronics, March 1960, pp. 4-11. |
| 1962 | Douglas Englebart, Augmenting the Human Intellect: A Conceptual Framework Summary Report, Stanford Research Institute, October 1962, 134pp. See also “The Augmented Knowledge Workshop” by Doug Englebart in A History of Personal Workstations, Adele Goldberg, ed., ACM Press, 1988, pp. 185-236. |
| 1974 | Radio Electronics (magazine) publishes “How to Build a Personal Minicomputer, the Mark-8,” July 1974. For Jon Titus’s perspective on his creation, see http://www.his.com/~jlewczyk/adavie/mark8b.html. Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) releases the Alto minicomputer Working at the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) of the Xerox Corporation, Charles Simonyi and Butler Lampson write the first WYSIWYG application, Bravo, a word processor, on the Alto minicomputer. The Alto supported a graphical user interface, used a bit-mapped display and allowed control of the cursor with a mouse. Creative Computing (magazine) launched |
| 1975 | Altair appears on cover of Popular Electronics (January) Dick Heiser opens the first retail store: The Computer Store, in Los Angeles Byte (magazine) launched Paul Terrell opens the Byte Shop in Mountain View, California |
| 1976 | Steve Jobs and Stephen Wozniak create the Apple computer in Job’s garage Apple I (a kit) was offered for $666 Gary Kildall founds Intergalactic Digital Research; first sale of Control Program for Microcomputers (CP/M) Electric Pencil offered for sale in December by Michael Shrayer Software. This is the first word processing package for a microcomputer. It was developed by Michael Shrayer a frequent attendee at the Home Brew Computer Club in Menlo Park, California. |
| 1977 | Tandy Corporation and Commodore offer computers with built-in monitors Microsoft founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to create and sell language translators; their first sale was a BASIC interpreter for the MITS Altair. Apple II is announced and establishes the benchmark for personal computers April: first West Coast Computer Faire held |
| 1978 | March: second West Coast Computer Faire held August: WordMaster offered for $150 at PC Expo in New York Seymour Rubinstein founds MicroPro International, in September November: third West Coast Computer Faire held Electric Pencil II released Intel’s first 16-bit processor, the 8086, debuts Apple II offered for sale John Draper develops EasyWriter for the Apple II; this is a clone of Electric Pencil; later chosen to be the word processing package for the IBM Personal Computer (in 1981) Apple Writer created for the Apple II by Paul Lutus Personal Computing (magazine) launched |
| 1979 | May: fourth West Coast Computer Faire: early version of WordStar demonstrated June: WordStar offered for sale ($495 for the software; $40 for the manual) September: Satellite Software International founded to market word processing software for the Data General minicomputer |
| 1980 | IBM selects PC-DOS from Microsoft as operating system for its new PC; Microsoft later gets permission from IBM to sell the operating system under its own name, as “MS-DOS,” to other minicomputer manufacturers and users WordStar for the Epson released SSI introduces SSI*WP for Data General minicomputers ($5,500) |
| 1981 | IBM introduces the personal computer (IBM PC) in August ($3,995) Xerox releases the Star, a commercial version of the Xerox Alto minicomputer with a graphical user interface and mouse; at $40,000 it was a marketing failure EasyWriter is selected by IBM for use with the IBM Personal Computer WordStar for CP/M-86 machines released Osborne 1 offered with WordStar; MailMerge, and SuperCalc Charles Simonyi leaves Xerox PARC and joins Microsoft |
| 1982 | Intel 80286: 16-bit data path; 16 Mbytes of memory; 3 MIPS [million instructions per second] Lotus Development Corp. offers Lotus 1-2-3 Columbia Data Products produces the first IBM PC clone Time magazine names The Computer as its “Man of the Year” WordPerfect 2.20 introduced for the IBM PC ($495) WordStar for PC-DOS released Volkswriter released by Lifetree Software PC Magazine launched |
| 1983 | Apple Lisa launched in May, with a “desk-top” metaphor using a mouse, icons, and pull-down menus ($9,995) September: Microsoft introduces MS Word for DOS September: NewWord 1 (WordStar clone) released by NewStar Inc. November: Microsoft unveils Microsoft Windows, an extension of the MS-DOS operating system that provides a graphical operating environment WordPerfect 3.0 released PC World magazine debuts Creative Computing magazine publishes special issue on word processing packages |
| 1984 | 8 January 1984: Seymour Rubinstein suffers a heart attack and relinquishes control of MicroPro Apple Macintosh ($2,495) is unveiled during Super Bowl football game Electric Pencil PC (for the IBM Personal Computer) released March: MicroPro goes public NewWord 2 released WordPerfect 4.0 released MultiMate for the IBM PC released by Softword Systems Inc. (later renamed Multimate International) |
| 1985 | Intel 80386: 32-bit data path; 4 Gbytes of memory; 5 MIPS January: Microsoft Word 1 for Macintosh; Word 2.0 for DOS released Ashton-Tate acquires MultiMate International WordStar 2000 released for MS-DOS and AT&T Unix computers WordPerfect 4.1 released Microsoft Windows 1.0 introduced |
| 1986 | Intel-based personal computers reach 50 percent of new sales WordPerfect takes off with introduction of 4.2; surpasses WordStar PC Magazine reviews 57 word processing packages for IBM PC and clones October: Microsoft Word 3 for Macintosh (there was no version 2) released October: Microsoft Word 3 (DOS) released October: WordPerfect 4.2 released |
| 1987 | WordStar 4.0 for CP/M and WordStar 4.0 for DOS released WordPerfect 4.1 for DEC/VAX, Amiga ($395) and Atari ST ($295) released WordPerfect is number 1 word processing package according to Liebowitz and Margolis, Winners, Losers & Microsoft October: Microsoft Windows 2.0 and Microsoft Word 4 (DOS) released |
| 1988 | Microsoft and IBM release OS/2 Intel-based personal computers constitute 50 percent of installed base PC Magazine reviews 55 word processing packages for IBM PCs and clones WordStar 5.0 for DOS released WordPerfect 4.2 for VAX, Data General, AT&T Unix, and NCR Unix released WordPerfect 1.0 for Macintosh released WordPerfect Office for DEC VAX and WordPerfect Office for DOS LANs released WordPerfect Library 1.0 for Commodore Amiga introduced WordPerfect 5.0 for DOS released WordPerfect 4.2 for SCO Xenix and Microport Unix introduced WordPerfect 4.2 for DEC Ultrix, Pyramid Tech Unix, Sun 3 introduced |
| 1989 | Intel 80486: 32-bit data path; 4 Gbytes of memory; 25 MIPS Microsoft introduces MS Word for Windows March: Microsoft Word 4 for Macintosh released Microsoft Word 5.0 (DOS) released WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS released August: Microsoft Office for Macintosh (Word, Excel and PowerPoint) introduced MicroPro changes name to WordStar International |
| 1990 | Microsoft Windows 3.0 released Microsoft Office for Windows (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint) introduced WordStar 6.0 for DOS released WordPerfect 4.2 for IBM System/370 introduced Word for Macintosh is #1 in sales (Macintosh wps) Microsoft becomes the first personal computer software company to exceed $1 billion in sales in a single year, with revenues of $1.18 billion |
| 1991 | Microsoft Word 2 for Windows released WordPerfect 5.1 for Windows introduced WordStar for Windows 1.0 introduced Lotus Smart Suite (Lotus 1-2-3, AmiPro, Freelance) introduced Microsoft Word 5 for Macintosh released Microsoft Word 5.5 (DOS) released |
| 1992 | Microsoft releases Windows 3.1 with more than 1,000 enhancements; creates unprecedented user demand with over a million advance orders worldwide Microsoft Office 3 (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint) released Word for Windows is best-selling word processing package (eclipsing WordPerfect DOS) WordStar 1.1 for Windows released WordPerfect 5.2 for Windows released Microsoft Office is 50 percent of Microsoft’s office application sales |
| 1993 | Intel Pentium: 64-bit data path; 4 Gbytes of memory; 111 MIPS Microsoft Windows NT 3.1 released Word for Windows 6 (renumbered to parallel DOS versions) released Word 6.0 for DOS released Word 6 for Macintosh released WordPerfect 6.0 for DOS released WordPerfect 6.0 for Windows released WordPerfect Corporation and Borland form an alliance and release Borland Office for Windows (WordPerfect, Quattro Pro, and Paradox) |
| 1994 | Novell buys WordPerfect Corporation and Quattro Pro and Paradox from Borland WordStar International becomes SoftKey International |