> On Sep 10, 2017, at 3:53 PM, Fred Cisin via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org> > wrote: > >>> What word-processor programs existed prior to micros? >> WPS-8, of course. Wang had word processors in that same era. Then there >> is the MT/ST which I think is older still. And if you define it as >> "computer based text editor" then you'd go back at least to TECO, which >> first >> appeared on the PDP-1, so that would be early 1960s. > > On Sun, 10 Sep 2017, couryho...@aol.com wrote: >> WPS-8 was awesome! I had one of the desks with the 8a in the back and rxo1 >> drives! >> and the daisy wheel printer then over time ended up with three.... but alas >> have none now... > > Surely SOMEBODY must have used one for a manuscript. Possibly after hours in > a business where the boss might not have even approved of using it for > "non-business" stuff. 'course it might have been something obscure and > forgettable. > > Virtually ALL "FIRST"s in history had obscure predecessors. > Hence the word "FIRST" should be avoided by any real historians with > integrity. > >
I think it all depends upon how you define “word processing”. For me I absolutely detest things like MS Word. Probably because I started with markup languages. The first one was one that I wrote for the IBM 1130 so I could do a high school research paper (1974). It was written in Fortran (sorry long gone) and the “paper” was all on punch cards and printed on a 1403 printer. I did it mainly because it was a pain to keep track of how to format for footnotes and attributions. At CMU I used Scribe that output to the XGP (Xerox Graphics Printer driven by a PDP-11/45). This was the first time I used something where there were selectable fonts (1976). At IBM *everything* was done with various versions of SCRIPT. At this point I can’t recall but I believe a number of the IBM manuals were all done in SCRIPT. I then used Interleaf (a *high* end document publishing/management system) and then FrameMaker (before Adobe completely screwed it up and finally killed it). I currently use LaTex for producing anything more complicated than an email. TTFN - Guy
