^KB and ^KK
Imagine a word processor that doesn't require you to lift your hands from the keyboard. What about never having to interrupt 'the flow' to fiddle with the mouse just to make something italic. A word processor that never crashed and just allowed one to simply write. Too good to be true?
Remember Wordstar?
I was browsing through Books for Less and found a book called 'Mastering Wordstar' for P80. This takes me back to the earliest days of PCs (yeah, I know this dates me). Wordstar (the early versions at least) fit in 1 360kb diskette and allowed one to simply write. Sure it didn't have the fancy bells and whilstles of MS Word, but to me it seems like a writer's word processor. It appears I'm not alone in thinking this, here's an excellent article written by sci-fi author Robert Sawyer.
To take this even further, I recall a story about one of my favourite writers, William Gibson, writing some of his first cyberpunk novels on *gasp* a typewriter. I can understand Stephen King writing Carrie on an old Royal, but the father of cyberpunk? There must be more to this.
Simply put, Wordstar (or any typewriter for that matter), forces a writer to actually write. Working on a PC can be extremely distracting: you'll be working on your masterpiece and a Yahoo message pops up. Or you have mail. Or you remember this website you just had to visit. Or the latest Star Wars trailer is ready for download. I know, i know... we just need a little discipline. But to those of us mortals who find discipline hard to come by, perhaps the best way to conquer temptation is to make it impossible to appear. But, looking at that blank screen (or piece of paper) sure is intimidating.
Last weekend, I visited what must be one of the last remaining typewriter repairmen in the city. In fact, the old guy is actully selling agricultural products now, but confesses that typewriters are his 'first love.' He actually seemed happy to see my two battered typewriters which I brought for him to repair. Now if I can only find a computer with a 5.25" drive, I can boot up my old copy of Wordstar and just maybe find some of the old magic.
In case you're wondering, ^KB and ^KK (control KB and control KK) are the keystrokes required to make text bold in Wordstar. I still remember the keystrokes to this day.
Remember Wordstar?
I was browsing through Books for Less and found a book called 'Mastering Wordstar' for P80. This takes me back to the earliest days of PCs (yeah, I know this dates me). Wordstar (the early versions at least) fit in 1 360kb diskette and allowed one to simply write. Sure it didn't have the fancy bells and whilstles of MS Word, but to me it seems like a writer's word processor. It appears I'm not alone in thinking this, here's an excellent article written by sci-fi author Robert Sawyer.
To take this even further, I recall a story about one of my favourite writers, William Gibson, writing some of his first cyberpunk novels on *gasp* a typewriter. I can understand Stephen King writing Carrie on an old Royal, but the father of cyberpunk? There must be more to this.
Simply put, Wordstar (or any typewriter for that matter), forces a writer to actually write. Working on a PC can be extremely distracting: you'll be working on your masterpiece and a Yahoo message pops up. Or you have mail. Or you remember this website you just had to visit. Or the latest Star Wars trailer is ready for download. I know, i know... we just need a little discipline. But to those of us mortals who find discipline hard to come by, perhaps the best way to conquer temptation is to make it impossible to appear. But, looking at that blank screen (or piece of paper) sure is intimidating.
Last weekend, I visited what must be one of the last remaining typewriter repairmen in the city. In fact, the old guy is actully selling agricultural products now, but confesses that typewriters are his 'first love.' He actually seemed happy to see my two battered typewriters which I brought for him to repair. Now if I can only find a computer with a 5.25" drive, I can boot up my old copy of Wordstar and just maybe find some of the old magic.
In case you're wondering, ^KB and ^KK (control KB and control KK) are the keystrokes required to make text bold in Wordstar. I still remember the keystrokes to this day.
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on Thursday, November 25, 2004 at 1:53 AM.
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