#Humor
7 messages in this thread
Jack: Sorry to butt in, but what is sprint? I know about FontMinder because I
have the earlier freeware FontManager. Does sprint do something with printers?
Sprint is a now-moribund DOS-based word processor marketed/sold by Borland
International. It is based upon FinalWord, which in turn was based upon a
marriage of the minicomputer editor EMACS and the Unix formatter Scribe. It is,
as I said, DOS-based and screen ugly, but has exceptional configurability (you
can essentially remap it so it becomes personalized–90% of the files are open
and designed to be modified), better PostScript support than anything in
Windows to date, has disk-limited virtual memory so your files can be almost
any size, allows up to 24 files to be open and remain open at once, and
includes automatic state save in which a compressed copy of everything in
memory is written to a separate disk file any time your hands leave the
keyboard so that even if you pull the plug or get a severe power outage you can
recover all your work even if unsaved. Many of its features are unduplicated by
any word processor past or present in any OS environment. Borland still uses it
internally and sells it, but stopped development on future versions when it
realized that it was never going to overtake WordPerfect. It retains a very
loyal following and because of its essentially open architecture a lot of
bright programmers have continued to upgrade and improve and add features to it
even though Borland does not. Quite a number of professional writers still use
it.
That explain things?
Oh, THAT Sprint! I remember Sprint. This was supposed to be the word
processor that would kill off all others because it could imitate their
keystrokes, and I recall there was even a claim that it could read and write
their file formats as well. What a shame that Borland didn't stick with it. It
now seems that all the real major software developers believe they need a
contender in each of the major software categories. Only Borland doesn't have
a winning word processor.
Your description of it sounds good. Do these programmers have access to the
source code, or are the updates add-ons/add-ins?
Well, actually it CAN read and write a number of formats (but not the most
recent ones) and it can indeed imitate both the keystrokes and menu structure
of other word processors, but that's incidental to those who really used it
since, other than as a transition aid, Sprint's real power was/is its infinite
personal customizability.
The two main programs, SP.COM and SPFMT.EXE are not open. All the rest is,
including all the library and driver files, macro files, screen menu and
command files, etc. These are all in ASCI and anybody with any knowledge of how
things work can customize and update to his or her heart's content. Source on
the two closed files isn't the problem, it's the fact that Borland won't permit
playing with them. There is in fact an underground of Sprint programmer types
who are developing a hyper-Sprint clone right now (using Borland's own Sprint
forum as their point of contact) so it's not a dead issue, and since all the
library and driver files are wide open the amount of improvement and
upgradability is quite large and impressive and continues on its own.
I'm afraid Borland hasn't been playing the game all that well of late in any
area, as you might know. QPro win was very late and while it's an excellent
spreadsheet with many unique features it's coming in to compete head to head
with Excel, which has the same relative position in Windows spreadsheets that
WordPerfect does in DOS. Paradox Win is also excellent, and has a crack at
things, but there's fierce competition on that level and it might be some time
before any winner emerges, and programmers have been waiting for dBase for
Windows, which is now not supposed to ship until the end of 1993, which may
well be too late. Ironically, the one area that is mature enough that it should
have a winner but still has none is word processing; Borland chose not to
compete in the one area that's really up for grabs. On the other hand, they
refuse to sell or license Sprint to anyone else. In the meantime, Support
Group, Inc. bought XYWrite and will have DOS and Windows versions ready to go
in a matter of months. Sprint is superior to XYW in a number of areas but it
won't get to compete.
You wonder what goes through their minds….
Jack,
We just ordered a new XyWrite 4.0 from Support Group. It will support a
mouse, among other things. (Never thought I'd see the day when I'd want a
mouse, because I'm also a touch typist.) Are you planning to look at it, or
are you waiting for the Windows version?
Lynne
I don't know. Maybe, maybe neither. We'll see. The main reason I have forty
jillion word processors here is that the companies hope that I'll so fall in
love with one of them I'll switch to it and they can use the endorsement in
their ads, etc. One of the few exceptions that never sent me even a brochure
was XYQuest, and I don't expect the shallower-pocket SGI, local to me or not,
to do it, either. Now, if they told me they now allowed 24 files to be open in
a virtual and recoverable swap file I MIGHT just take a look, but as long as,
deep down, I know I'm going to continue writing in Sprint until something
considerably better comes along, is it worth four hundred bucks to see what the
other folks are doing? And although I have heard they finally support
PostScript, a first-time PS release can't possibly tap the major features a
mature PS product does.
Jack,
Well, I'll report to you on the latest XyWrite. My husband's office
uses it, so there isn't any danger of our skipping an upgrade.
It is Sprint's ability to write to a virtual swap file that is going to
make me adopt it. Couldn't care less that it looks like Tapcis, because the
pretty graphics typefaces only slow down the word processors that I've tried.
But I'm looking forward to skipping frequent intermediate saves of new
material to floppies. (I was amazed the first time I quit Sprint and
returned to find a screen identical to the one I had "aborted" by quitting.)
Xy-Write's nine windows have been enough, though I can use more.
(Especially when I'm working with fairly short files [sometimes only a
couple of sentences] that have to be rewritten slightly for secondary and
tertiary use.) All that's holding back the Sprint project is personal
obligations (my mother's nursing home finances, etc.). And I'll clear
the backlog eventually.
Lynne