Claris

Last updated
Claris International Inc.
Company type Subsidiary
Industry Software
PredecessorFileMaker Inc.
Founded1987;37 years ago (1987)
Founders
Headquarters
Cupertino   OOjs UI icon edit-ltr-progressive.svg
Key people
  • Brad Freitag (CEO)
  • Lucy Chen (vice president, worldwide product release engineering)
  • Ryan McCann (vice president, sales)
  • Peter Nelson (vice president, engineering)
  • Ann Devens (vice president, marketing)
  • Sophia Yungen (corporate counsel and secretary)
Products Claris Emailer, ClarisWorks, Claris CAD, ClarisDraw, Claris Resolve, Claris Impact, FileMaker (Pro, Go, Server, Cloud), Claris Home Page, MacWrite, MacPaint, MacDraw, MacProject
Number of employees
300
Parent Apple Inc.
Website claris.com

Claris International Inc., formerly FileMaker Inc., is a computer software development company formed as a subsidiary company of Apple Computer (now Apple Inc.) in 1987. It was given the source code and copyrights to several programs that were owned by Apple, notably MacWrite and MacPaint, in order to separate Apple's application software activities from its hardware and operating systems activities.

Contents

In 1998, the company divested itself of all but its flagship product, and reformed as FileMaker Inc. In 2019, FileMaker Inc. announced at DevCon that it was restoring the Claris brand name. Also in 2019, Claris acquired Italian startup, Stamplay, a cloud-based integration platform which connects web services like Dropbox and Slack without writing code, [1] and announced they would rename their product offering as Claris Connect. [2]

The company develops, supports and markets the relational database program FileMaker. The FileMaker Platform is available for the macOS, Microsoft Windows and iOS operating systems and is aimed towards business users.

History

Creation

Claris old logo.svg
First Claris logo
Former Claris headquarters in Santa Clara ("The Wedge"), circa 2022 5201 Patrick Henry Drive.jpg
Former Claris headquarters in Santa Clara ("The Wedge"), circa 2022

During the early days of the Macintosh computer, Apple shipped the machines with two basic programs, MacWrite and MacPaint, so that users would have a working machine "out of the box". However, this resulted in complaints from third-party developers, who felt that these programs were good enough for so many users that there was little reason to buy something better. [4]

Apple decided to allow the programs to "wither" so that the third-party developers would have time to write suitable replacements. The developers did not seem to hold up their end of the bargain, and it was some time before truly capable replacements like WriteNow came along. In the meantime users complained about the lack of upgrades, while the third-party developers continued to complain about the possibility of upgrades.[ citation needed ]

Eventually Apple decided the only solution was to spin off the products to a third party of its own creation, forming Claris in 1987. Claris was also given the rights to several lesser-known Apple products such as MacProject, MacDraw, and the hit Apple II product AppleWorks. Claris' second corporate headquarters (nicknamed "The Wedge") was in Santa Clara, about six miles from the main Apple campus.[ citation needed ]

At first Claris provided only trivial upgrades, limited to making the products continue to run on newer versions of the Macintosh operating system. In 1988, Claris purchased FileMaker from Nashoba Systems and quickly released a rebranded version called FileMaker II, to conform to its naming scheme for other products, such as MacWrite II. The product, however, changed little from the last Nashoba version. Several minor versions followed; it was succeeded by FileMaker Pro 1.0 in 1990. In the meantime, development began on major overhauls of their entire product line, including FileMaker. Each of these would be eventually released as part of the Pro series of products.[ citation needed ]

In 1990, Apple decided that Claris should remain a wholly owned subsidiary, as opposed to being completely spun off in an initial public offering. The company president soon left, and over the next year most of the other executives followed.[ citation needed ]

That same year Claris also purchased an integrated application written by two former Claris employees. After rebranding in a style similar to FileMaker, MacDraw, and MacWrite, it was released in 1991 as ClarisWorks, and became another huge success for the company. After a lengthy series of ups and downs, this product was eventually taken back by Apple in 1998 and rebranded as AppleWorks (for Macintosh).[ citation needed ]

In September 1992, Claris released a cross-platform version of FileMaker for both the Mac and Windows; except for a few platform-specific functions, the program's features and user interface were the same. Up to this point FileMaker had no real relational capabilities; it was limited to automatically looking up and importing values from other files. It only had the ability to save a state—a filter and a sort, and a layout for the data. Version 3.0, released around 1995, introduced new relational and scripting features. [5]

Transition to FileMaker Inc.

By the mid-1990s it appeared to most observers that Apple was in serious danger of disappearing. The main ClarisWorks development team left Claris, disillusioned with the product and the market, and founded Gobe Software, which produced a Claris-like office suite for BeOS.[ citation needed ]

Facing declining sales, Claris management decided that FileMaker was the only product worth keeping, and put all of the rest of the products on indefinite hold. By 1998 the transition was complete and the company renamed itself as FileMaker Inc. Claris's only other major product, ClarisWorks, was taken back by Apple to become AppleWorks. The company kept FileMaker and Claris HomePage 3.0. The latter was discontinued in 2001 leaving FileMaker as its lone offering until January 8, 2008, when the company released Bento, a template-based database application with a leaning toward information from other applications. Bento was discontinued on September 30, 2013.[ citation needed ]

Return to Claris

During DevCon 2019, the developers' conference, FileMaker announced it was resurrecting the Claris name and re-branding commenced. FileMaker Inc. changed its name to Claris International. [6] The FileMaker product name remains as Claris FileMaker.[ citation needed ]

Products

FileMaker

FileMaker is a cross-platform relational database application. It integrates a database engine with a graphical user interface (GUI) and security features, allowing users to modify the database by dragging new elements into layouts, screens, or forms. It started as an MS-DOS app called Nutshell, developed by Nashoba Systems.[ citation needed ]

Pro series

In the late 1980s, Claris began a major upgrade effort, rewriting all of its products to use a more modern and common user interface. The result was the "Pro" series: MacDraw Pro, MacWrite Pro, and FileMaker Pro. In order to provide a complete office suite they later purchased the rights to the Informix Wingz spreadsheet on the Mac, rebranding it as Claris Resolve, [7] and added the new presentation program Claris Impact.[ citation needed ]

The series was released piecemeal over a period of about two years, during which period Microsoft was able to dominate the market with Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel. While the Claris packages were arguably much more "approachable" than the Microsoft applications, the Claris software applications lacked some features of the now-mature Microsoft suite, leaving them lacking in "checkbox features." Their value was further eroded by aggressive bundling deals from Microsoft that could allow Word, Excel, and PowerPoint to be purchased for a cost not much higher than MacWrite alone—a bundle that Claris did not match. Claris did offer ClarisWorks, an all-in-one package; and, while the price was right, ClarisWorks was very limited and could not compete in the business market. Microsoft also released a Works package.[ citation needed ]

Microsoft's domination of the Macintosh office suite software marketplace would be replicated five years later when (following the release of Windows 95), Microsoft Office crushed its two main rivals in Windows software: the WordPerfect/Quattro Pro suite and the Lotus SmartSuite.[ citation needed ]

Other applications

By the late 1980s, HyperCard needed updating as well but Apple management did not see any value in the product and let it wither. Complaints eventually became loud enough that they decided something had to be done. Studying the problem, they decided that all software should be released through Claris, and sent HyperCard and the Mac OS[ citation needed ] to them. Many of the developers refused to move to Claris, leading to a serious split in development that delayed future releases of both products. The Mac OS was soon returned to Apple; HyperCard was ignored for a time, before also returning briefly as a part of the QuickTime group.[ citation needed ]

In 1988, Claris published Claris CAD, a 2-D CAD package, and Claris Graphics Translator, a translation package for Claris CAD.[ citation needed ]

In early 1989, Claris published SmartForm Designer, [8] software to design forms, and a companion product, SmartForm Assistant, software to fill forms created by SmartForm Designer.[ citation needed ]

In 1994, Claris published Amazing Animation, software aimed at children and young teenagers, allowing them to produce their own short animated films.[ citation needed ]

In 1995, Claris purchased and released Claris Home Page, which enjoyed popularity as one of the few truly GUI-based WYSIWYG HTML editors of the time.[ citation needed ]

Other products added to the line included Claris Emailer; Claris OfficeMail, which facilitated setup by non-specialists [9] and Claris Organizer. These products were part of a new effort to diversify Claris and no longer chase the "office" market which, by this point, was considered a lost cause.[ citation needed ]

The Bento database product aimed at home users or small businesses was released in 2008 and discontinued in 2013.[ citation needed ]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TeachText</span> Text editor made by Apple Computer

The TeachText application is a simple text editor made by Apple Computer and included with System 7.1 and earlier. It was created by Apple programmer Bryan Stearns with later versions created by Stearns and Francis Stanbach. TeachText was one of the only applications included with System 7, leading to its frequent role as the application to open "ReadMe" files. It was named "TeachText" as a nod to this role in tutorials and other introductory materials.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cyberdog</span> Suite of computer applications for Internet use

Cyberdog was an OpenDoc-based Internet suite of applications, developed by Apple Computer for the Mac OS line of operating systems. It was introduced as a beta in February 1996 and abandoned in March 1997. The last version, Cyberdog 2.0, was released on April 28, 1997. It worked with later versions of System 7 as well as the Mac OS 8 and Mac OS 9 operating systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">OpenDoc</span> Software componentry framework standard

OpenDoc is a defunct multi-platform software componentry framework standard created by Apple in the 1990s for compound documents, intended as an alternative to Microsoft's proprietary Object Linking and Embedding (OLE). It is one of Apple's earliest experiments with open standards and collaborative development methods with other companies. OpenDoc development was transferred to the non-profit Component Integration Laboratories, Inc., owned by a growing team of major corporate backers and effectively starting an industry consortium. In 1992, the AIM alliance was launched by Apple, IBM, and Motorola, with OpenDoc as a foundation. With the return of Steve Jobs to Apple, OpenDoc was discontinued in March 1997.

FileMaker is a cross-platform relational database application developed by Claris International, a subsidiary of Apple Inc. It integrates a database engine with a graphical user interface (GUI) and security features, allowing users to visually modify a database. Versions for desktops, servers, iOS and web-delivery have been released.

MacWrite is a WYSIWYG word processor application released along with the first Apple Macintosh systems in 1984. Together with MacPaint, it was one of the two original "killer applications" that propelled the adoption and popularity of the GUI in general, and the Mac in particular.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">AppleWorks</span> Office software suite from Apple

AppleWorks was an integrated office suite containing a word processor, database, and spreadsheet. It was developed by Rupert Lissner for Apple Computer, originally for the Apple II platform and launched in 1984. Many enhancements for AppleWorks were created, the most popular being the TimeOut series from Beagle Bros which extended the life of the Apple II version of AppleWorks. Appleworks was later reworked for the Macintosh platform.

Lasso is an application server and server management interface designed to develop internet applications. It is also a general-purpose, high-level programming language. Originally a web datasource connection tool for Filemaker and later included in Apple Computer's FileMaker 4.0 and Claris Homepage as CDML, it has since evolved into a complex language used to develop and serve large-scale internet applications and web pages.

PlainTalk is the collective name for several speech synthesis (MacinTalk) and speech recognition technologies developed by Apple Inc. In 1990, Apple invested a lot of work and money in speech recognition technology, hiring many researchers in the field. The result was "PlainTalk", released with the AV models in the Macintosh Quadra series from 1993. It was made a standard system component in System 7.1.2, and has since been shipped on all PowerPC and some 68k Macintoshes.

Wingz was a spreadsheet program sold by Informix in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Originally developed for the Macintosh, it was later ported to Microsoft Windows, OS/2, NeXTSTEP and several other commercial flavors of Unix. In spite of many positive reviews, including one calling it "clearly the spreadsheet of the future", the market was rapidly entrenching Microsoft Excel. Informix eventually gave up on the desktop market and reverted solely to database sales in the mid-1990s. Claris licensed and sold an extensively cleaned up version as Claris Resolve in 1991, but it was far too late to market to have any effect.

Publish and Subscribe was a document linking model introduced by Apple Computer in System 7. Named the Edition Manager in developer documentation, it extended the existing cut and paste editing model with a notification system; "subscribers" could include parts of "published" documents within themselves, and changes to the original published document would be noticed and updated by the subscribers. To the user the system was very similar to cut and paste in concept; material would be selected from the source document and published, creating an edition file, then placed into the subscriber by selecting that clipping file and positioning it inside the document.

XTND was a document import/export system developed by Claris for their products on the Apple Macintosh. Products supporting XTND placed an additional popup menu in the open and save dialogs, allowing users to read and write documents of any supported format. The name is a four-letter contraction of extend, the Mac using four-letter identifiers in its system resource files.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gobe Software</span>

Gobe Software, Inc was a software company founded in 1997 by members of the ClarisWorks development team that developed and published an integrated desktop software suite for BeOS. In later years, it was the distributor of BeOS itself.

Omnis Studio is a rapid application development (RAD) tool that allows programmers and application developers to create enterprise, web, and mobile applications for Windows, Linux, and macOS personal computers and servers across all business sectors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Integrated software</span>

Integrated software is a software for personal computers that combines the most commonly used functions of many productivity software programs into one application.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bento (database)</span>

Bento is a discontinued database application for Mac OS X made by the former FileMaker Inc., since renamed to Claris. Bento differed significantly from the company's flagship product, FileMaker Pro, in that it relied heavily on templates and integration with other applications. By default, Bento's data sources included Apple's Address Book and Calendar applications, which it could modify directly. FileMaker announced on July 31, 2013, that it would discontinue Bento on September 30, 2013.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Classic Mac OS</span> Original operating system of Apple Mac (1984–2001)

Mac OS is the series of operating systems developed for the Macintosh family of personal computers by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1984 to 2001, starting with System 1 and ending with Mac OS 9. The Macintosh operating system is credited with having popularized the graphical user interface concept. It was included with every Macintosh that was sold during the era in which it was developed, and many updates to the system software were done in conjunction with the introduction of new Macintosh systems.

References

  1. ↑ Finley, Klint (2019-08-06). "Attention Apple Retro-Heads: Claris is Back!". Wired. ISSN   1059-1028 . Retrieved 2019-08-06.
  2. ↑ Brad, Freitag (August 6, 2019). "Introducing Claris International Inc". Claris.com. Claris International Inc. Retrieved 6 August 2019.
  3. ↑ "New Products". Computerworld. 27 (19): 41. May 10, 1993.
  4. ↑ Pollack, Andrew (1987-04-29). "Apple to Spin Off Software Business". The New York Times.
  5. ↑ Lashinsky, Adam (July 17, 2014). "After 17 years, Bill Campbell steps down from Apple's board". Fortune. Retrieved July 17, 2014.
  6. ↑ "Apple subsidiary FileMaker Inc. changes its name (back) to Claris". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2019-08-07. Retrieved 2024-02-04.
  7. ↑ Benjamin, Louis E Jr; Zilber, Jon (June 1992). "New Dimensions in Spreadsheets". MacUser . Vol. 8, no. 6. p. 32.
  8. ↑ Flynn, Laurie (January 9, 1989). "Claris Finally Releases Forms Packages for Mac". InfoWorld.
  9. ↑ "Claris OfficeMail Overview". Archived from the original on 21 July 2012.

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.