Sidekick (1984) 3 Utility PIM DOS OS2 Windows

Borland Sidekick is a DOS based PIM (Personal Information Manager) and one of the first widely-used TSR (terminate and stay resident) programs. The key feature of Sidekick was that one could use Sidekick's utilities while using most other MS-DOS applications. This was important because MS-DOS had no built-in multi-tasking or task switching capabilities.

• 1.x
• Plus
• 1.0 for OS/2
• 2.0
• 1.0 for Windows
• 2.0 for Windows

Sideways (1985) 0 Spreadsheet Utility DOS

Sideways is a printing utility that enables you to print a spreadsheet sideways (landscape) when using a graphics printer. While that might seem like a common basic function these days, this is something that early spreadsheets lacked. Using continuous form (tractor feed) paper, a Sideways printout may seamlessly span multiple pages without having to tape or glue pages together. Sideways was sometimes bundled with spreadsheet products. "Sideways leaves no text un-turned".

• 3.11
• 3.3

Slidewrite Plus (1985) 0 Presentations Graphics DOS

Slidewrite Plus is an easy to use general purpose business graphing and slide making program. It supports the usual bar, line, scatter, ,area, mixed hi-low, and pie charts. It competed against graphing programs like Harvard Graphics and Freelance.

• 1.10
• Plus 1.00

Softkey/WordStar PC Paintbrush (1993) 0 Graphics Windows

Softkey/WordStar's PC Paintbrush is a paint program and photo editor for Windows 3.x. It only somewhat resembles Zsoft PC Paintbrush but is basically re-branded Zsoft PhotoFinish, released after Zsoft was bought out. It was initially sold by WordStar International, and then later SoftKey.

• 1.x

SoftLogic Disk Optimizer (1987) 0 Utility DOS

Disk Optimizer, from SoftLogic Solutions Inc., was a low cost disk defragmentation utility that competed directly against the Norton Utilities. Like other disk optimizers, it re-arranges where files are stored on a hard drive to decrease file access time. It was, however, not as full featured or robust as the Norton Utilities.

• 2.x

Software Bridge (1989) 0 Utility DOS

Software Bridge is a set of executable word processor file converters. It can convert between a large number of word processors while preserving formatting.

• 3.x

Software Toolworks World Atlas (1992) 0 Education DOS

World Atlas is a computerized world map with thousands of facts and statistics for over 200 counties. Includes detailed city data, country flags, and anthems.

• 3.0

Stanford Graphics (1993) 0 Graphics Windows

Stanford Graphics is a combination of Presentation and Analysis software. It contains both common slide making and graphing abilities as well as powerful statistical and technical analysis tools. Specialized technical graphics include contour and color keyed contour plots, polar plots, smith and 3-D Smith chars, and planar and XYZ vector and trajectory plots. Sigma Plot, and BBN Software RS/1 Harvard Graphics.

• 2.x
• 3.0

Stardock Object Desktop (1996) 1 Utility OS2

Object Desktop is a set of utilities for OS/2 power users. It provides a number of visual enhancements, define hotkeys, an improved editor, desktop configuration backup, archive management, system help advisors, and system backup.

• 1.5.x

StarProof Bridge (1984) 0 Word Processor Utility DOS

The StarProof Bridge is a utility that enabled IBM Word Proof to work with WordStar documents.

• 1.00

StepWay Desktop Publisher (1994) 0 Graphics Publishing DOS

StepWay Desktop Publisher is a very low-end budget graphics editor and desktop publisher for DOS. It appears to have been targeted at new computer users and educational markets. The StepWay software is considered "modular", with additional functionality added in separate modules, sold separately. The separate modules they sold included Desktop Publisher, Art Shop, To Do List, Checkbook, Banner, Cookbook, Home Inventory, Greeting Cards, Mail List, and Calendar.

• 1.x

System Commander (1996) 6 Utility DOS

System commander, from V Communications, Inc, was a commercial boot manager for PCs. It offered a graphical menu and the ability to hide other partitions from the selected OS. It supported a variety of OSes including DOS, Windows 9x, Windows NT/2000, Linux, OS/2, and various Unixes.

• 2.x
• 3.x
• Deluxe 4.00
• 2000 (5.x)

The Draw (1988) 1 Graphics DOS

The Draw was a popular shareware ANSI graphics and animation editor used to make graphics for BBSes and DOS programs.

• 3.x
• 4.x

The Program Director (1989) 0 Utility DOS

The Program Director is a tiny little customizable menuing program. It was sold commercially as budget software.

• 1989

Toolworks DOS Tutor (1990) 0 Education DOS

Toolworks DOS Tutor is an extensive DOS tutorial with detailed descriptions about the operation of common IBM PC compatibles, peripheral hardware, and the operation of DOS.

• 1.00

ToyBox Menu Manager / Magic Desk (1992) 0 Utility DOS

ToyBox II, later renamed to Magic Desk, is a simplified graphical menu system that lets you launch your DOS applications from a selection of tiled iconic buttons. Supports nested hierarchies, includes an icon editor, and a number of common icons.

• 2.x
• 3.x (Magic Desk)

Trend Micro Chip Away (1993) 0 Utility DOS

Released in the early 90s by the Japanese company Trend Micro Devices, Inc (later just Trend Micro), Chip Away Viruses is a DOS based virus scanner that is intended to run from a hardware product built in to a PC motherboard before the system boots. It includes a custom embeddable DOS (called X-DOS), but it can be run from regular DOS. Trend Micro also produced the products PC Rx (A regular software virus scanner), and PC-cillin (a hardware/software combo that keeps critical boot information in a special device). Users sometimes misinterpreted the name "ChipAway Virus" as being a virus itself.

• 2.x

TurboCAD (1993) 1 Graphics Engineering Windows

TurboCAD is a low-cost 2D/3D Computer Aided Design program that competed with AutoCAD and Generic CADD. It was first available for DOS, and later Mac, Windows 3.x, and Windows 9x/NT.

• 1.0
• 3.x

Ulead iPhoto (1991) 4 Graphics Windows

iPhoto is a Microsoft Windows based image editor bundled with scanners. It features the ability to adjust scanned photographs in many ways, convert to different color depths, and export to a number of different file formats.

• 3.x
• 1.x Plus
• 4.x Plus

Ulead MediaStudio (1996) 0 Graphics Video Audio Windows

MediaStudio is a suite of multimedia editing tools. It includes a video editor, video capture tool, image editor, sound editor, and morphing tool. Also supports video conversion, batch mode operation, and overlays.

• 2.0

Valdocs (1984) 4 Word Processor Spreadsheet Graphics Communications CPM

Valdocs is an office suite that was bundled with the Epson QX-10 (and later QX-16) Z80 based computer. It was "WYSIWYG" in that it could display different fonts of different sizes in the editor on the screen. It could also embed images in the document, and print the document to a graphics printer.

• 2.00
• Plus
• Plus III

VersaCAD (1988) 1 Graphics Engineering DOS

First released in 1983 by T & W Systems Inc (later Versacad Corporation) and based on their earlier T-Square product, VersaCAD is a sophisticated professional object design and drawing tool for the IBM PC. It competed heavily against AutoCAD. A very in-depth history of VersaCAD can be found on Cadhistory (PDF Link)

• 5.3

Video Tape File System (1991) 0 Utility Reference DOS

Video Tape File System is a database program that you can use to organize your VHS video tapes. You can sort by title, actor, or category, print labels, and print a complete reference. It includes a top 100 movie reviews, can retrieve movie review information from Prodigy, and it includes 50 colored labels to get you started. There were version for Apple II and IBM PC.

• Plus

VideoWorks (1985) 0 Presentations Graphics MacOS

VideoWorks is a Macintosh animation program that eventually became Macromedia/Adobe Director.

• 1.00
• II

VisiTutor for VisiWord (1983) 1 Education DOS

VisiTutor is a computerized tutorial program that will guide a user through how to use VisiCorp VisiWord. application suite that also included VisiCalc, VisiWord, VisiFile, VisiSpell, and VisiTrend/Plot.

• 1.0