Microsoft Office (1991) 415 Word Processor Spreadsheet Presentations Publishing PIM Database Windows MacOS

Microsoft Office is a bundle of Microsoft's productivity application. This includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and later Mail, Office Manager, and Outlook. The "1.x" versions of Microsoft Office were simply a marketing bundle of the standalone products sold together with no other packaging changes. Even though these were distinct applications, rather than one single monolithic program, they shared a similar user interface, integrated well together and shared the ability to embed documents from one application in the documents of another.

• 2.x
• 4.3
• 97/98
• 2001 (Mac)

PageMaker (1987) 60 Publishing Windows MacOS

Aldus PageMaker, later Adobe PageMaker, is a desktop publishing program for Mac and Windows. First released in 1985, PageMaker was the first desktop publishing program for the Macintosh. It was followed over a year later with the release of 1.0 for the IBM PC. The PC version was a notable application as it was one of the few rare applications which would run under Windows 1.x. PC PageMaker 1.0 bundled a runtime version of Windows. This enabled MS-DOS users who had not decided to buy Windows to run PageMaker. Aldus skipped version 2.0 on the PC to bring version number in sync with the 3.0 Mac product.

• 5.0

Adobe Acrobat (1993) 43 Publishing MacOS Windows Unix

Adobe Acrobat, first released in 1993, is a tool for creating portable electronic documents. Its documents retain complex formatting when used across differing systems, so that they appear identical when viewed on screen or printed to a printer. Acrobat accomplishes this by encapsulating Adobe's PostSript printer language in to a document file format and offering the ability to embed fonts that are not present on the target system.

• 1.x
• 2.x
• 3.x
• 4.x

Instant Artist / Print Artist (1992) 39 Graphics Publishing Novelty DOS

Instant Artist, later renamed to Print Artist, is a greeting card and sign creation program that uses vectorized graphics. It was created by The Pixellite Group, the original authors of The Print Shop, and published in 1992 by Autodesk. It was later sold by Sierra On-line. It features a high quality set of generic reusable clip art. The clip art uses vector based technology that was also used in BannerMania.

• 1.0 (DOS)

The Print Shop (1984) 24 Publishing DOS MacOS

The Print Shop is a home oriented publisher capable of creating calendars, banners, greeting cards and other printable goods. It started off on the Apple II and Commodore 64 where it became popular for its simplicity and ease of use. From day one, it featured interactive editing, on-screen artwork/layout selection, print previewing, and a library of customizable clipart.

• For IBM PC (DOS)
• 1.x (Mac)
• The NEW PS (DOS)
• Deluxe
• Deluxe 1.x (Mac)

Ventura Publisher (1986) 16 Publishing DOS MacOS

Ventura Publisher, originally from Xerox, is a professional desktop publishing program for the GEM graphical environment and later Windows. It has the distinction of being the first popular publishing program for the IBM PC platform. It competed with Aldus PageMaker, which initially was more popular on the Mac platform. There are also versions for Mac and OS/2.

• 1.0
• 1.1
• 2.0
• 3.x for Macintosh
• 3.0 for DOS-GEM

The Print Shop Companion (1984) 6 Graphics Publishing DOS

As the name suggests, the Print Shop Companion is a companion product to The Print Shop. It contains extra miscellaneous functionality such as graphics editors and envelope printing.

• For IBM PC (DOS)
• The NEW PSC (DOS)
• Deluxe

QuarkXPress (1986) 6 Publishing MacOS DOS

QuarkXPress was THE standard publishing software during the 1990s. However it failed to update its product line to newer technologies in a timely manager, charged insane amounts for updates or additional features that should have been built in to the software, and became very abusive to their customers. Later versions required a parallel port/ADB copy protection dongle. They lost most of their market share to Adobe InDesign.

• 1.x
• 2.x
• 3.x

FrameMaker (1990) 6 Publishing Unix MacOS Other Windows

FrameMaker, originally from Frame Technology Corporation and later Adobe, is a professional document system for creating large, complex documents with highly structured layout. It was often accompanied by FrameReader.

• 2.x
• 4.x

Adobe Dimensions (1992) 5 Graphics Publishing MacOS

Adobe Dimensions was a low cost 3-d object editing and rendering program. Unlike other 3d rendering programs, Dimensions is specifically geared towards producing illustrations for print. programs, such as Adobe Illustrator or Freehand, and edited to create 3d objects. Then, instead of outputting a pixilated raster image, it outputs in postscript bezier curves, which can then be further processed by other 2d illustration packages.

• 1.0
• 2.0

ClarisWorks (1991) 4 Word Processor Spreadsheet Presentations Graphics Publishing Database Windows MacOS

ClarisWorks is an all-in-one Word Processor, Spreadsheet, Database, Graphics Editor, and Presentations tool from Claris. In 1998, after version 5.0.2, ClairsWorks was purchased by Apple and re-branded under the "AppleWorks" name. It is not related to the Apple II AppleWorks product.

• 1.x
• 2.x
• 3.x
• 4.x
• 5.x
• For Kids 1.0

Print Magic (1988) 3 Publishing DOS

Print Magic is a sign, card, and banner printing program, similar to Print Master. Compared to others of the time, its functionality is rather crude, lacking previews or undo.

• 1.0

Adobe PageMill (1997) 3 Publishing MacOS

PageMill, from Adobe, is a What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get web page authoring tool. It was discontinued in February 2000, due to the acquisition and promotion of Adobe GoLive.

• 2.0

GEM Desktop Publisher (1988) 3 Publishing DOS

GEM Desktop Publisher, from Digital Research, is a GEM 3.x based Desktop publishing program. It is not as sophisticated as Ventura Publisher. It uses a VMM (Virtual Memory Manager) in place of EMS/XMS, and requires a hard disk. It can be used with GEM Artline to provide illustrations.

• 2.x

BannerMania (1989) 2 Graphics Publishing DOS

Banner Mania is a banner making program for IBM PC compatible computers, enabling the user to create banners, posters, signs and logos. It can create and print multi-page banners, with 19 different fonts and effects in 16 colors.

• 1.0

Springboard The Newsroom (1985) 2 Publishing DOS

"The Newsroom" is a very simplified desktop publishing program aimed at novices and children. It uses a simplified step-by-step interface similar to the original "The Print Shop", and bundles a variety of fun clipart images. requires a PC or PCJr with one floppy drive, CGA, and 128K of ram. Additionally, there were versions for the Apple II, and Commodore 64. transfer documents between any two instances of The Newsroom, even between the IBM/Apple/C64 platforms.

• 1985
• Pro 1989

NewsMaster (1987) 2 Publishing DOS

NewsMaster, from Unison World, is a primitive low-cost desktop publishing program aimed at home users and low end PCs. It supports both dot-matrix and laser printers. Separate clipart libraries were also available, and it could make use of PrintMaster clipart.

• 1.5

Wang Freestyle (1990) 2 Utility Publishing DOS

Wang Freestyle is an "annotation" program that operates by making screen shots of DOS applications, to which the user may then add hand-written notes using a stylus or add a voice recording with a telephone-like handset. It features a Macintosh-like desktop that displays the annotated documents graphically on a proprietary high resolution monitor, and integrates a form of mail and fax.

• 1.x

PrintPower (1987) 2 Publishing DOS Other

PrintPower is a tool for creating greeting cards, signs, banners, and calendars, similar to The Print Shop. It was a rather clunky low-end bottom of the bargain-barrel budget title. The later "Pro" version seems to give it a more Mac-like user interface.

• 1.x
• Pro

Publish-IT (1988) 1 Publishing DOS MacOS

Publish-It! is a WYSIWYG desktop publishing tool originally created by the UK based GST Software for the TOS/GEM Atari ST system. There were versions for IBM PC/GEM, Apple II, Macintosh (as "Publish-It! Easy"), and later Microsoft Windows. desktop publishing tools, it is not a full word processor, but rather imports text and focuses on high-quality formatting and printing. budget title for home users. SoftKey also released a version branded as Key Publisher

• 1.x
• Easy 2.x
• 2.0

Express Publisher (1990) 1 Publishing DOS

Express Publisher, by Power Up Software Corporation. is a very easy to use but somewhat limited entry level-desktop publishing program.

• 2.0

Label Magic (1991) 1 Publishing DOS

Label Magic is an excellent labeling system that generates professional looking labels in minutes, complete with graphic icons. Part of the program is a utility to let you create your own icons. There is more to this program than logos, however. You can do mailing lists with or without icons. If your printer can handle envelopes, you can print your logo and return address directly on envelopes. You can use it to print letterheads. You can also have alphabetically sorted directory entries. You can preview the label and icon on screen with Hercules monographics, CGA, MCGA, EGA, AT&T HiRes, or VGA. Where many graphics oriented shareware programs are weakest is in the number of printers they support because each type of printer requires different routines to print graphics. Label Magic is well above average in this regard, supporting the C.Tioh 8510, NEC 8023, Epson FX (and compatibles), Epson LX, IBM Graphics, IBM Proprinter, HP Deskjet and Deskjet Plus, HP LaserJet II, HP PaintJet, Epson LQ-2500 and (Joseph M. Albanese) (Reg.Fee: $25)

• 3.00

FreeHand (1988) 1 Graphics Publishing MacOS

FreeHand is a vector based drawing program used to create illustrations. It is similar to CorelDraw and Adobe Illustrator. Initially it offered more features and flexibility than illustrator. It was created by Altsys, sold through Aldus, then sold to Macromedia, and then finally was assimilated by Adobe. Later versions repositioned itself as a content creation system for the web through Flash. The final version was Freehand MX (version 11) in 2003.

• 1.0
• 2.0

Policies Now! (1993) 1 Utility Publishing DOS

Policies Now is a document creation wizard that specializes in corporate policies. It provides general purpose templates with carefully constructed language that are customized via a series of questions. The results may be manually customized further with a built in text editor. accompanied by "DescriptionsWrite Now!" (A job description writing tool), and "Personal Policy Expert". These were renamed to "Policies Now!", "Description Now!", and "Policies Now! HR Pro Edition" respectively.

• 1.30

Halo DPE (1987) 1 Graphics Publishing DOS

Halo DPE (Desktop Publishing Editor) was an attempt by Media Cybernetics to enter the desktop publishing market by shoehorning additional text processing abilities in to their Dr. Halo II product.

• 1.x