Microsoft GIF Animator (1997) 3 Graphics Windows

Back before HTML 5, Flash, or fancy scripting, the only way you could be sure that you would annoy your readers was to use animated GIFs. Not wanting to disappoint, Microsoft made their own GIF creation program: GIF Construction Set. In the late 90's sprit of crushing competition, Microsoft gave it away for free. It was also bundled with Microsoft Image Composer and Microsoft FrontPage. Construction Set. Although in practice GIF Construction set worked better for building the animated GIFs, and then GIF Animator was useful for touching things up afterwards. (Mainly removing the shareware GIF Construction Set's "created by" comment text. :P )

• 1.0

Microsoft Great Greetings (1995) 0 Publishing Windows

Microsoft Great Greetings is a greeting card creation program that runs within the Microsoft BOB environment. It is unique in that it was the only retail product produced for Microsoft BOB. It is not quite the same as Microsoft's mainstream card software: Microsoft Greetings.

• 1.0

Microsoft MapPoint (1999) 0 Reference Windows

Microsoft MapPoint is a business oriented mapping program. It includes geographic and demographic data across the US and enables integration with external databases or programs. It was targeted towards businesses as a lower cost solution than a full blown Geographic Information System (GIS).

• 2000

Microsoft Musical Instruments (1994) 0 Reference Novelty Windows

Microsoft Musical Instruments is a multimedia CD ROM encyclopedia of musical instruments from around the world. Part of the Microsoft Home family of multimedia products.

• 1.x

Microsoft Publisher Design Pack (1994) 0 Publishing Windows

The design pack is a set of templates and tools for use with Microsoft Publisher.

• 1

Microsoft Vizact (1999) 2 Publishing Windows

Microsoft Vizact 2000, was an application used to create HTML+TIME documents, adding effects such as animation.

• 2000

Mindscape Complete Reference Library (1995) 0 Reference Windows

The Mindscape Complete Reference Library is a low end, and rather buggy, multimedia library targeted at the educational market. It included an encyclopedia, maps, almanac, dictionary, thesaurus, quotes, and a grammar style reference.

• 3.5

Mindscape Home Office Assistant (1996) 0 Reference Windows

Mindscape Home Office Assistant is a searchable multimedia collection of home business related books and resources. It includes content such as maps, business document templates, and videos.

• 1.x

Mosbys Medical Encyclopedia (1997) 2 Reference Windows

Mosbys Medical Encyclopedia is a multimedia CD-ROM containing information about medicines, illnesses, and anatomy.

• 2.x

Multimedia Cats (1995) 1 Reference Novelty Windows

A multimedia database, from Inroads Interactive, about all kinds of cats from all around the world. In the event of an Internet apocalypse, all you will need is this CD and a CD of cartoon farting clips.

• 1.0

My Advanced MailList (1991) 2 Database Windows

My Advanced MailList is a comprehensive mailing list manager database that supports a wide variety of label formats, embedded graphics, import/export with other databases, and printing POST-NET barcodes.

• 1.x (Win)

Oracle Forms and Reports (1997) 8 Database Windows

Oracle Forms and Reports is a GUI application builder. It is similar to Visual Basic, but uses the PL/SQL language and integrates heavily with Oracle Server databases.

• 4.5 (Developer 2000)
• 6i

Oracle Server (1991) 10 Server Database Windows

Oracle Server is an enterprise grade relational database used in many corporations. It was mainly targeted at high end server operating systems, such as IBM AIX, Sun Solaris, HP UX, Digital VMS, Linux, and Microsoft Windows NT. Oracle makes current versions of their software avaialble for download, but older versions usually disappear.

• 7
• 8

PageMaker (1987) 35 Publishing Windows OS2 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.

• 1.00
• 1.0A
• 3.00
• 3.01
• 4.0
• 5.0
• 6.x

Paint Shop Pro (1990) 23 Graphics Windows

JASC Paint Shop Pro is a simple and easy to use bit-mapped graphics editor. It supports a wide variety of file formats, and photo manipulation functions that were comparable to PhotoShop. It has good support for editing 256 color palletized images that made it ideal for editing web graphics. It was first released in 1990 for Windows 3.0 as just "Paint Shop", and early versions gained popularity through the distribution of shareware releases. It lost popularity in 2003 when 8.0 was introduced with a redesigned UI and in 2004, JASC was acquired by Corel.

• 1.x
• 3.x
• 4.x
• 5.x
• 6.x
• 7.x

PC Paint (1984) 2 Graphics Windows

PC Paint, from Mouse Systems Corporation, is a Macintosh MacPaint-like paint program for the PC. It was often bundled with Mouse Systems mice. Despite the similar sounding name and appearance, it is NOT related to Microsoft/ZSoft PC Paintbrush.

• 3.x

PC Paintbrush (1984) 5 Graphics Windows

ZSoft PC Paintbrush is a bitmap drawing program visually similar to MacPaint. The earlier DOS versions were often bundled with Microsoft and Microsoft compatible mice, and were notable for supporting a huge variety of video adapters. It competed against Mouse Systems PC Paint (not related despite the similar name). ZSoft PC Paintbrush eventually became Microsoft Paintbrush included in Windows 3.x. For Microsoft's rebranded version see Microsoft Mouse and Microsoft Paintbrush

• 1.05 (Win)
• Plus 1.x (Win)

PharmAssist (1994) 0 Reference Windows

Softkey PharmAssist is a simple and easy to use CD-ROM reference of medications and health information.

• 2.x

PrintMaster (1985) 2 Graphics Windows

Print Master was another sign and banner creation program similar to The Print Shop. The earlier version got in to trouble for looking too much like the Print Shop.

• Gold 3.0 (Win)
• Gold 4.0 (Win)

Publish Pac (1987) 0 Graphics Publishing Windows

Publish Pac is a set of drivers and a small scanning application for use with DEST scanners. It does not do much without the scanner, but it is interesting as it runs under Microsoft Windows 1. It includes a Windows 1.04 runtime, so DOS users would not have to purchase Windows.

• 2.x

PubTech File Organizer (1989) 0 Utility Publishing Windows

The PubTech File Organizer is an alternate desktop shell for Windows that attempts to mimic the Macintosh Finder. It features drive icons directly on the desktop, a Garbage icon, and folders that open in new cascaded windows with icons representing files. Applications are easily accessible from an "Applications" menu. Files and programs may be placed directly on the File Organizer desktop. In many ways, it is similar to the Windows 95 desktop, but the earlier versions work under Windows 2!

• 2.11
• 3.10

QuarkXPress (1986) 4 Publishing Windows

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.

• 4.0

Quattro Pro (1987) 4 Spreadsheet Windows DOS

Quattro Pro, initially just named "Quattro", is a spreadsheet application from Borland International. It competed against Lotus 1-2-3 and Excel, and had several advantages including tabbed sheets, and the ability to handle up to a million rows. Quattro Pro was the subject a lawsuit by Lotus, simply because because Quattro Pro copied their menu user interface, but Lotus claimed this was not allowed. This also affected The Twin and VP-Planner.

• 1.0 (Win)
• 5.x
• 6.x (Win)

R:Base (1985) 2 Database Windows

R:Base, from Microrim and first released in 1983, was a popular relational database that competed with Ashton Tate's dBASE product. R:Base was the first relational database for the IBM PC, also notable as earlier relational databases typically required more powerful hardware. R:Base also includes a form and report generator that is optimized for the capabilities of the IBM PC and features the ability to add or remove fields without losing data or relationships.

• 5.0 (Win)

Rand McNally New Millennium World Atlas (1997) 0 Reference Windows

Rand McNally New Millennium World Atlas is a world map that includes roads, geographical information, statistics, and area profiles.

• 1997