Hugo and Nebula award-winning science fiction writer Robert J. Sawyer is one of the many aficionados of WordStar, a DOS word processor beloved of a certain generation of author. Sawyer still uses 1992's version 7 of the ancient software, having written 25 novels on it, and put together an online archive, complete with the free-and-open-source software required to run it on modern computers: "Anyone can have WordStar for DOS 7.0 up and running on a Windows computer in a matter of minutes using this archive; with just a little bit more work, WordStar for DOS 7.0 also runs just fine under Linux and Mac OS."
I've put weeks of work into this. Included are not only full installs of the program (as well as images of the installation disks), but also plug-and-play solutions for running WordStar for DOS 7.0 under Windows, and also complete full-text-searchable PDF versions of all seven manuals that came with WordStar — over a thousand pages of documentation.
I've also included lots of my own explanations on how to use and customize WordStar, many WordStar-related utility programs, and numerous other goodies.
Carolyn Clink kindly did the scanning of the manuals. When she was done, I said to her, "Countless WordStar users will thank you." She replied, "Oh, I think I can count them." ;)
The Register notes that it's not clear at this point who owns WordStar, not that it matters much. Those not wedded specifically to WordStar (and perhaps many of those who are) might like WordTsar (previously), a contemporary clone with modern features.
Previously:
• A word processor that improvises keyboard jazz while you type
• I wrote this review of a Freewrite on a Freewrite
• The Microwriter, a tiny chording word processor from 1984
• Famous writers with their first word processors
