🚀 go-pugleaf

On 3/16/2018 6:07 PM, Charles Richmond wrote:
> On 3/16/2018 4:30 PM, Scott Lurndal wrote:
>> Andreas Kohlbach <a...@spamfence.net> writes:
>>> I was writing a blog article about early word processors and 
>>> spreadsheets
>>> <https://news-commentaries.blogspot.com/2018/03/history-of-wordprocessors-and-spread.html> 
>>>
>>> but only covered early 8-Bit micros. Assuming Electric Pencil was the
>>> first while WordStar or SuperCalc (spreadsheet) only really became 
>>> famous
>>> in the early days of the late 70s to early 80s.
>>>
>>> I know that in offices before that era type writers were used, even 
>>> if an
>>> IBM Selectric could ease the work. But they were hardware. They 
>>> hadn't a
>>> display (monitor) to edit text and only when done print it out.
>>>
>>> Still I wonder if big machines like some IBM 360/370 did not have word
>>> processors... By word processor I do not mean any text editor. A word
>>> processor should at least be able to wrap a word into the next line 
>>> if it
>>> didn't fit into the current line. And had some markup for defining 
>>> a bold
>>> or italic character and sub- and superscript.
>>
>> UW (University of Waterloo) script.
>> Digital RUNOFF
>> Burroughs ADS (Automatic Documentation System).
>> troff
>>
>> all used markup sequences
>>
> 
> These things like RUNOFF are "text formaters", not word processors.  
> And IBM selectrics *are* typewriters.
> 
The MT/ST and MC/ST were not really "typewriters", they were 
standalone WP machines that included a selectric for IO. It's true 
that their capabilities were limited compared to later machines, but 
they could edit text (in a linear way, not random access), do word 
wrap, accept run-time insertions like mail merge (the operator 
manually provided the merge text), etc.