Protext (Arnor)

Last updated

Protext is a British word processing program, developed by Arnor Ltd, of Peterborough in the decade following 1985. Originally written for the Amstrad CPC 464, it was later sold for the Amstrad PCW series of word processors, for MS-DOS based PCs, the Atari ST, and the Commodore Amiga.

Contents

A version was developed for the Acorn Archimedes and released in October 1990 which ran in full screen text mode, with Arnor indicating that "increased demand" had led to the product being released for the platform and that with "high enough" demand, the product would be upgraded to be "Risc OS compatible" [note 1] and that other products would be released. The product was priced at £149.95. [1] An accompanying note in the box mentioned Arnor's intention to develop a future release that would support operation in the RISC OS desktop with drag and drop capabilities, but this was never developed. According to a review of the software in early 1991, a multi-tasking version operating in a desktop window was being developed, but these plans were presumably abandoned due to a lack of market interest, with the review noting that the program's inability to multi-task "may deter many Arc users" who would already be accustomed to compliant desktop software. Being a "printer font only" program relieved the software of any reliance on the RISC OS printer drivers (which was also a characteristic of Acorn's First Word Plus product that had been introduced before RISC OS, although subsequently updated), and drivers were provided for a range of dot-matrix and inkjet printers, but PostScript support was absent. However, support for including graphics was rudimentary and no graphical previews of printed documents were possible. With Acorn's own product being somewhat cheaper and with other competitors becoming established, Protext was considered to do "what it aims to do extremely well" at a price, with the suggestion made that potential purchasers might have wanted to wait for a multi-tasking version. [2] Expectations persisted of a desktop version during 1991. [3]

In 1991 Arnor were commissioned by Amstrad to develop a special version of Protext for the NC100 portable computer. [4] This was included in the ROM on the NC100, NC150 and NC200. Translated versions of Protext were published in German, French and Swedish. The German version was known as Prowort due to a name conflict.

After the closure of Arnor in 1995, the program was taken over by a group of enthusiasts including the original authors: Mark Tilley and Gavin Every; and relaunched with a new version for the PC. A companion database program Prodata was also sold. Since December 2008, Protext together with manuals and technical information has been freely downloadable, in formats for PC, Commodore Amiga and Atari ST.

Protext was designed for speed and flexibility [5] and features the usual word processing features, such as a spell checker, thesaurus, auto-correction and good printer support. While later releases supported use of a mouse, the fastest editing with Protext would be using the keyboard, with all commonly used editing commands available with control key combinations.

An unusual feature of Protext is its programmability. A mail merge programming language allows the user to input data from a text file or Prodata database. This is achieved by 'Stored commands' within the body of the text, an idea borrowed from the 'dot commands' of WordStar. Stored commands are similarly used to control formatting and layout of the text for printing. A preview mode showed the formatted layout but Protext did not display the fonts on screen.

The macro record facility allowed a series of keystrokes to be 'learnt' and assigned to a single key or stored as an 'exec' file. For programmers, a useful feature is the easy manipulation of characters outside the alphanumeric range, in search strings or macros.

Protext may be used to write a webpage, generate a webpage from stored data, or to create text for export and final formatting to a WYSIWYG word processor or DTP desktop publishing programme.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the graphical user interface</span>

The history of the graphical user interface, understood as the use of graphic icons and a pointing device to control a computer, covers a five-decade span of incremental refinements, built on some constant core principles. Several vendors have created their own windowing systems based on independent code, but with basic elements in common that define the WIMP "window, icon, menu and pointing device" paradigm.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WordPerfect</span> Word processing application

WordPerfect (WP) is a word processing application, now owned by Alludo, with a long history on multiple personal computer platforms. At the height of its popularity in the 1980s and early 1990s, it was the dominant player in the word processor market, displacing the prior market leader WordStar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">BBC BASIC</span> Version of the BASIC programming language

BBC BASIC is a version of the BASIC programming language released in 1981 as the native programming language for the BBC Micro home/personal computer, providing a standardized language for a UK computer literacy project of the BBC. It was written mainly by Sophie Wilson.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Acorn Archimedes</span> Personal computer

Acorn Archimedes is a family of personal computers designed by Acorn Computers of Cambridge, England. The systems are based on Acorn's own ARM architecture processors and the proprietary operating systems Arthur and RISC OS. The first models were introduced in 1987, and systems in the Archimedes family were sold until the mid-1990s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GEM (desktop environment)</span> Operating environment created by Digital Research

GEM is a discontinued operating environment released by Digital Research in 1985. GEM is known primarily as the native graphical user interface of the Atari ST series of computers, providing a WIMP desktop. It was also available for IBM PC compatibles and shipped with some models from Amstrad. GEM is used as the core for some commercial MS-DOS programs, the most notable being Ventura Publisher. It was ported to other computers that previously lacked graphical interfaces, but never gained traction. The final retail version of GEM was released in 1988.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">RISC OS</span> Computer operating system by Acorn Computers Ltd

RISC OS is a computer operating system originally designed by Acorn Computers Ltd in Cambridge, England. First released in 1987, it was designed to run on the ARM chipset, which Acorn had designed concurrently for use in its new line of Archimedes personal computers. RISC OS takes its name from the reduced instruction set computer (RISC) architecture it supports.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amstrad NC100</span>

The Amstrad NC100 Notepad was an A4-size, portable Z80-based computer, released by Amstrad in 1992. It featured 64 KB of RAM, the Protext word processor, various organiser-like facilities, a simple calculator, and a version of the BBC BASIC interpreter.

Timeworks Publisher was a desktop publishing (DTP) program produced by GST Software in the United Kingdom.

Xara is an international software company founded in 1981, with an HQ in Berlin and development office in Hemel Hempstead, UK. It has developed software for a variety of computer platforms, in chronological order: the Acorn Atom, BBC Micro, Z88, Atari ST, Acorn Archimedes, Microsoft Windows, Linux, and more recently web browser-based services.

An application directory is a grouping of software code, help files and resources that together comprise a complete software package but are presented to the user as a single object.

Amiga software is computer software engineered to run on the Amiga personal computer. Amiga software covers many applications, including productivity, digital art, games, commercial, freeware and hobbyist products. The market was active in the late 1980s and early 1990s but then dwindled. Most Amiga products were originally created directly for the Amiga computer, and were not ported from other platforms.

Amiga support and maintenance software performs service functions such as formatting media for a specific filesystem, diagnosing failures that occur on formatted media, data recovery after media failure, and installation of new software for the Amiga family of personal computers—as opposed to application software, which performs business, education, and recreation functions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of personal computers</span> History of the consumer personal computer

The history of the personal computer as a mass-market consumer electronic device began with the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s. A personal computer is one intended for interactive individual use, as opposed to a mainframe computer where the end user's requests are filtered through operating staff, or a time-sharing system in which one large processor is shared by many individuals. After the development of the microprocessor, individual personal computers were low enough in cost that they eventually became affordable consumer goods. Early personal computers – generally called microcomputers – were sold often in electronic kit form and in limited numbers, and were of interest mostly to hobbyists and technicians.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">AmigaOS</span> Operating system for Amiga computers

AmigaOS is a family of proprietary native operating systems of the Amiga and AmigaOne personal computers. It was developed first by Commodore International and introduced with the launch of the first Amiga, the Amiga 1000, in 1985. Early versions of AmigaOS required the Motorola 68000 series of 16-bit and 32-bit microprocessors. Later versions were developed by Haage & Partner and then Hyperion Entertainment. A PowerPC microprocessor is required for the most recent release, AmigaOS 4.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1st Word</span> Word processor for Atari ST computers

1st Word is a word processor program for the Atari ST developed by GST Computer Systems and published in 1985. It was given away with all ST systems from December 1985 for the next two years. Although it was relatively well received, it was a very simple program, lacking most power features and was very slow when working in large documents. In spite of any limitations, its wide availability made the program's .DOC file format became a de facto standard for the platform and was widely supported by other programs like desktop publishing systems.

<i>Fun School</i> Video game series

Fun School is a series of educational packages developed and published in the United Kingdom by Europress Software, initially as Database Educational Software. The original Fun School titles were sold mostly by mail order via off-the-page adverts in the magazines owned by Database Publications. A decision was made to create a new set of programs, call the range Fun School 2, and package them more professionally so they could be sold in computer stores around the UK. Every game comes as a set of three versions, each version set to cater for a specific age range.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Floppy disk variants</span> Types of floppy disk formats

The floppy disk is a data storage and transfer medium that was ubiquitous from the mid-1970s well into the 2000s. Besides the 3½-inch and 5¼-inch formats used in IBM PC compatible systems, or the 8-inch format that preceded them, many proprietary floppy disk formats were developed, either using a different disk design or special layout and encoding methods for the data held on the disk.

RISC OS, the computer operating system developed by Acorn Computers for their ARM-based Acorn Archimedes range, was originally released in 1987 as Arthur 0.20, and soon followed by Arthur 0.30, and Arthur 1.20. The next version, Arthur 2, became RISC OS 2 and was completed and made available in April 1989. RISC OS 3 was released with the very earliest version of the A5000 in 1991 and contained a series of new features. By 1996 RISC OS had been shipped on over 500,000 systems.

Impression is a desktop publishing application for RISC OS systems. It was developed by Computer Concepts and initially made available in pre-release form during 1989, having been demonstrated in February 1989 at the Which? Computer Show and subsequently announced as being available from June 1989. The "completed" version was eventually delivered on 18th January 1990.

References

  1. ↑ "New Arc WP". Acorn User. October 1990. p. 7. Retrieved 17 April 2021.
  2. ↑ Williams, Simon (April 1991). "Protextion Racket?". Acorn User. p. 109. Retrieved 17 April 2021.
  3. ↑ Jennings, Peter (August 1991). "ProTips". Archive. pp. 22–23. Retrieved 17 April 2021.
  4. ↑ Sue Schofield (1993-07-09). "Home Computer: How computers should be: Sue Schofield shoulders her Amstrad notebook and takes a Swiss Army knife to the opposition". The Independent . Retrieved 2009-03-19.
  5. ↑ Protext web site

Notes

  1. ↑ Presumably, what was meant was "RISC OS compliant" in Acorn's own terminology, meaning desktop application.
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.