 | |
 Cover from March 2000 | |
| Editor | Alun Williams |
|---|---|
| Former editors | David Mery, Will Watts, Robert Schifreen, Mark Adams |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| First issue | 1986 |
| Final issue | 2000 |
| Company | Centaur Media |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
.EXE Magazine was a monthly computer software magazine published in the United Kingdom from 1986 to 2000. [1]
Founded in 1986 by Mark Adams, former co-founder of PR agency Text 100, .EXE (rhymes with 'not sexy' as the magazine's official pronunciation guide states) was inspired by Dr. Dobb's Journal, the PC Tech Journal and the C Users Group Newsletter. It was conceived as a title aimed at professional programmers, in contrast to the majority of hobbyist-oriented computer magazines of the period. Adams served as the magazine's first editor.
The magazine's heyday coincided with the availability of cheap PC clones running MS-DOS and the first widely adopted version of Windows, [2] both factors which encouraged the spread of programming into smaller businesses and created an audience for .EXE and similar titles that followed. Unusually for the UK, the magazine was sold primarily by postal subscription and controlled circulation, rather than in retail newsagents. This reflected its focus on a professional audience, as many readers obtained their copies through their employment.
.EXE's content consisted largely of practical how-to articles focusing on particular platforms or techniques, along with more general software development content, news, book reviews and regular columns. With an audience consisting primarily of PC software developers, the content was largely for the DOS and Windows platforms, although over the years .EXE published articles on OS/2, Modula-2, Smalltalk and PalmPilot development, among others. The magazine featured regular columns on C++, Java, Visual Basic and Unix and took an early interest in Linux and open source more generally, particularly under the editorship of David Mery, featuring interviews with prominent open source and free software proponents including Eric Raymond and Richard Stallman.
In 1992 the magazine's publisher Process Communications was sold to Centaur Communications (now Centaur Media), [3] ostensibly because Centaur was interested in a Process title called Software Management. In the end, Centaur elected to keep .EXE running and closed Software Management and the third Process title, BASIC Magazine. This left .EXE as the only print title aimed at software professionals at Centaur, and the only title focused on computing and technology, at least until New Media Age debuted in 1995.
In 1995 the magazine was re-branded as EXE Magazine, dropping the dot, which caused some controversy among regular readers and spawned the nickname 'Dotless' for the new version. At around the same time the magazine launched an online venture called EXplodE - later EXE Online - which started as a companion title with its own editor, but was later taken over by the print editorial team and evolved into an online archive of content and a marketing vehicle for the print title.
Several of EXE's editorial staff were well known in the UK technology community as journalists or otherwise. The magazine's second editor, Robert Schifreen, had previously been notorious for his involvement in the hacking of a Telecom Gold account belonging to Prince Philip. Other editors or staff writers included Will Watts, Danny O'Brien, Cliff Saran and Hobbit Coward.
In later years, EXE began to feature more product reviews and 'advertorial' content such as salary surveys, as its publishers sought to make the magazine more commercially focused. The magazine partnered with the UK-based Association of C and C++ Users to produce conference events. However, the market for computer magazines in general was in decline, and as knowledge and technical information about software development began to move primarily online, print titles like EXE began to lose readers and advertisers. Centaur shuttered the magazine in the summer of 2000, selling its content and branding - perhaps ironically - to the magazine that inspired its creation, Dr. Dobb's Journal .
EXE was also the first home of satirical columnist Verity Stob, who went on to write for Dr Dobbs and, latterly The Register .
Tiny BASIC is a family of dialects of the BASIC programming language that can fit into 4 or fewer KBs of memory. Tiny BASIC was designed in response to the open letter published by Bill Gates complaining about users pirating Altair BASIC, which sold for $150. Tiny BASIC was intended to be a completely free version of BASIC that would run on the same early microcomputers.
Computer magazines are about computers and related subjects, such as networking and the Internet. Most computer magazines offer advice, some offer programming tutorials, reviews of the latest technologies, and advertisements.
Dr. Dobb's Journal (DDJ) was a monthly magazine published in the United States by UBM Technology Group, part of UBM. It covered topics aimed at computer programmers. When launched in 1976, DDJ was the first regular periodical focused on microcomputer software, rather than hardware. In its last years of publication, it was distributed as a PDF monthly, although the principal delivery of Dr. Dobb's content was through the magazine's website. Publication ceased at the end of 2014, with the archived website continuing to be available online.
Computer Gaming World (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly through the 1990s and became one of the largest dedicated video game magazines, reaching around 500 pages by 1997.
PC Zone, founded in 1993, was the first magazine dedicated to games for IBM-compatible personal computers to be published in the United Kingdom. Earlier PC magazines such as PC Leisure, PC Format and PC Plus had covered games but only as part of a wider remit. The precursor to PC Zone was the award-winning multiformat title Zero.
PC Magazine is an American computer magazine published by Ziff Davis. A print edition was published from 1982 to January 2009. Publication of online editions started in late 1994 and continued as of 2023.
A DOS extender is a computer software program running under DOS that enables software to run in a protected mode environment even though the host operating system is only capable of operating in real mode.
EMM386 is the expanded memory manager of Microsoft's MS-DOS, IBM's PC DOS, Digital Research's DR-DOS, and Datalight's ROM-DOS which is used to create expanded memory using extended memory on Intel 80386 CPUs. There also is an EMM386.EXE available in FreeDOS.
Custom PC was a UK-based computer magazine originally published by Dennis Publishing Ltd and subsequently sold to Raspberry Pi Foundation. It was aimed at PC hardware enthusiasts, covering topics such as modding, overclocking, and PC gaming. The first issue was released in October 2003 and it was published monthly until the final issue, number 235, was released in February 2023.
bit-tech is an online magazine for computer hardware enthusiasts, gamers and case modders, based in the UK. It was founded in 2000, became a fully professional online publication in 2005, and announced its acquisition by Dennis Publishing in October 2008. Dennis Publishing then partnered the site with existing monthly publication Custom PC magazine, making Bit-Tech the online version of the magazine. At this point the two editorial teams were totally integrated. However, due to a restructure in January 2012 the website and magazine had separate editors again, although several of the writers still contributed material to both publications. It is owned by The Media Team.
Microsoft Diagnostics (MSD) was a software tool developed by Microsoft to assist in the diagnostics of 1990s-era computers. Users primarily deployed this tool to provide detailed technical information about the user's software and hardware and to print the gathered information, usually for use by support technicians in troubleshooting and resolving problems. The assumptions made by the program were valid until the late 1990s: it does not handle plug-and-play USB or other new technologies that appeared around 2000.
Micro Mart was a weekly computer magazine published in the United Kingdom by Dennis Publishing Ltd. As of 2015, it had a circulation of 5,422. In a letter to subscribers in December 2016 it was announced that the magazine would cease publication with issue No 1445 : "After 30 amazing years of telling it like it is, Micro Mart magazine is logging off."
Igromania is a Russian video game website and formerly a magazine.
Tech Advisor, previously known as PC Advisor, is a consumer tech website and digital magazine published by Foundry, a subsidiary of IDG Inc, which also produces Macworld, PCWorld and TechHive. IDG Inc was acquired by Blackstone in 2021.
Overload is a bi-monthly professional computer magazine published by ACCU, that was established in 1993 and is edited by Frances Buontempo. It aims to "publish a high standard of articles about all aspects of software development". All issues of Overload, starting from August 1998, are available online.
A command-line interface (CLI) is a means of interacting with a device or computer program with commands from a user or client, and responses from the device or program, in the form of lines of text. Such access was first provided by computer terminals starting in the mid-1960s. This provided an interactive environment not available with punched cards or other input methods.
DOS Protected Mode Services (DPMS) is a set of extended DOS memory management services to allow DPMS-enabled DOS drivers to load and execute in extended memory and protected mode.
The Dr. Dobb's Excellence in Programming Award was an annual prize given to individuals who, in the opinion of the editors of Dr. Dobb's Journal, "made significant contributions to the advancement of software development." The Excellence in Programming Award includes a $1,000 prize that was donated in the award winner's name to a charity of the winner's choice. The award was launched in 1995 in the print edition of Dr. Dobb's Journal and was given each year until 2009. In his March 1995 article introducing the awards, then editor-in-chief Jonathan Erickson wrote that the award was intended to recognize "achievement and excellence in the field of computer programming." Erickson explained that the winners were "selected by a special editorial committee" of the magazine. Because Dr. Dobb's serves an audience of software developers, the Excellence in Programming Award is specifically intended to recognize resources for programmers: languages, code libraries, tutorial books, and so on. Developers of shrinkwrap software intended for retail sale, custom software for corporate use, embedded software, or general-purpose applications were not considered for the award.