- Reaction score
- 1,828
WordStar's most recent claim to fame might be that it's the word processing application on which George R.R. Martin is still not finishing A Song of Ice and Fire.
But many writers loved and still love WordStar, a word processor notably good for actual writing. As computers moved on from DOS to Windows, and word programs grew to encompass features that strayed far from organizing words on a page, WordStar hung back, whether in DOS emulation or in the hearts of its die-hard fans.
One of those fans is Robert J. Sawyer, an award-winning science fiction author still using the program last updated in 1992. Deciding that the app is now "abandonware," Sawyer recently put together as complete a version of WordStar 7 as might exist. He bundled together over 1,000 pages of scanned manuals that came with WordStar, related utilities, his own README guidance, ready-to-run versions of DOSBox-X and VDosPlus, and WordStar 7 Rev. D and posted them on his website as the "Complete WordStar 7.0 Archive."
Why would Sawyer—and Michael Chabon and Anne Rice and Arthur C. Clarke and James Gunn—keep using a DOS program, decades past its last update, with quite a few workarounds needed for modern systems? Because it's meant to help writers keep on writing. Like Vim or Emacs, it can be used with a system of keyboard commands entirely without a mouse; unlike Vim or Emacs, it is built for words and paragraphs, not code. Sawyer detailed this in an essay on his site, republished on Ars Technica in 2017. WordStar puts powerful commands near your strongest fingers and makes navigating text, bookmarking, and leaving unpublished notes for yourself far easier than WordPerfect, Word, or almost anything since.
arstechnica.com
WordStar writing application:
But many writers loved and still love WordStar, a word processor notably good for actual writing. As computers moved on from DOS to Windows, and word programs grew to encompass features that strayed far from organizing words on a page, WordStar hung back, whether in DOS emulation or in the hearts of its die-hard fans.
One of those fans is Robert J. Sawyer, an award-winning science fiction author still using the program last updated in 1992. Deciding that the app is now "abandonware," Sawyer recently put together as complete a version of WordStar 7 as might exist. He bundled together over 1,000 pages of scanned manuals that came with WordStar, related utilities, his own README guidance, ready-to-run versions of DOSBox-X and VDosPlus, and WordStar 7 Rev. D and posted them on his website as the "Complete WordStar 7.0 Archive."
Why would Sawyer—and Michael Chabon and Anne Rice and Arthur C. Clarke and James Gunn—keep using a DOS program, decades past its last update, with quite a few workarounds needed for modern systems? Because it's meant to help writers keep on writing. Like Vim or Emacs, it can be used with a system of keyboard commands entirely without a mouse; unlike Vim or Emacs, it is built for words and paragraphs, not code. Sawyer detailed this in an essay on his site, republished on Ars Technica in 2017. WordStar puts powerful commands near your strongest fingers and makes navigating text, bookmarking, and leaving unpublished notes for yourself far easier than WordPerfect, Word, or almost anything since.
Sci-fi writer and WordStar lover re-releases the cult DOS app for free
"Compared to it, Microsoft Word is pure madness"—Anne Rice.
WordStar writing application:
