----- Original Message ----- From: "Fred Cisin via cctalk" <cctalk@classiccmp.org> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk@classiccmp.org> Sent: Tuesday, November 26, 2019 9:51 PM Subject: Re: First Internet message and ...
> On Tue, 26 Nov 2019, TeoZ via cctalk wrote: >> The only reason Apple sold so many Apple II's was because some software >> designer came out with Visicalc. > > Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston ("Software Arts") > They sold it through "Personal Software", who became "VisiCorp" > http://www.bricklin.com/history/sai.htm > > Frankly, I think that word processing was more responsible than > spreadsheet for microcomputer sales. > But, Apple had a headstart by having both. > > A far from complete and only partially chronological list: > Electric Pencil (Michael Shrayer) > Electric Pencil for CP/M (with a program to transfer files from Electric > Pencil disks to and from CP/M disks) > Wordstar for CP/M (MicroPro (later WordStar, Inc)) > Easy Writer (Apple II, by John Draper) > Scripsit (TRS80) > Electric Pencil for TRS80 > Easy Writer for IBm PC > Wordstar for PC > Electric Pencil for PC (Harv Pennington) > Microsoft Word (PC and Apple) > WordPervert > PC-Write (Bob Wallace) > ------------------------ WordPro, Paper Clip (written by local boys) and PaperMate for the Commodore PET (and later for the C64)