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Whatever Happened To Textmode WordPerfect?

Posted by Cliff on from the remember-the-classics dept.

wedonneednoSTEEKINGguis asks: "After an hour of Google searching that turned up empty, I turn to the next best thing, Slashdot's hordes of trained monkeys. Does anyone know whatever happened to the console-mode (character-based, text-mode, whatever you want to call it) Word Perfect for Linux 5.1? I'm -positive- I recall it being included with the full GUI package in some Linux version or another, but naturally all traces of it have disappeared from Corel's FTP site, and I can't even find any references except for people talking about using emulation to run MS-DOS binaries. Word Perfect continues to be the WP of choice in our office (as well as many legal firms, so I've heard), and we don't need the features or want the overhead of a graphical version. Does anyone know where this beast might currently be located, or has it become unofficial abandonware?" Ah, I remember quite a few teenage summers where I worked in jobs that used the text version of WordPerfect. Of course, I never could remember keyboard command for "bold"...Alt-F5, or was it F6?

16 comments

  1. Was if really WP for Linux ?? by urbanjunkie · · Score: 1

    I remember 5.1 well - lovely white chars on a CLEAN CLEAN blue screen...ahhh. Was there really a native version for Linux ? I've found this link to run WP5.1 for Dos under Linux using dosemu - would that do ?

    1. Re:Was if really WP for Linux ?? by urbanjunkie · · Score: 1

      Dude, you're right. maybe you should also follow your own advice.

  2. Read the article first ! ALL of it. by urbanjunkie · · Score: 1

    Ok - doh...just read the article properly...dos binaries *just won't do* !! Oh well...at least I got first (and maybe last) post !

  3. Doen't Make sense by SanLouBlues · · Score: 2

    Why would Corel port the entire WP 5.1 code over, when the could just map the origional key-stroke functions over to the GUI version. I don't know if they actually did that, but it would make sense to think they would have either mapped the f-keys, or just not bothered doing anything too labor intensive for all those people who still want the functionality of 5.1 . If you think about it why go to the extra effort of porting it when it isn't necesary (like running the GUI is the worst thing ever). If anyone cares too much, they should just remake it from scratch on sourceforge. Call it WordCloseToPerfect.

    1. Re:Doen't Make sense by meldroc · · Score: 1

      There are reasons to continue running the old text-mode version. One of my friends is legally blind and uses a speech synthesizer to read on-screen text outloud when he is working. He has GUI versions of his software, as the speech synthesizer can OCR text in GUI windows, but that mode is less than reliable (skips lines, misreads words, etc.) He vastly prefers using text-mode WordPerfect, as the speech synthesizer has a much easier time reading characters straight out of the text buffer in ASCII.

      --

      Meldroc, Waster of Electrons
    2. Re:Doen't Make sense by SanLouBlues · · Score: 1

      Good call, I was enlightened to a huge number of reasons to continue text-mode by a whole bunch of people. My bad. (Of course that is by far the best reason I've heard.

  4. Dude, I still HAVE WP51 for DOS! by AFCArchvile · · Score: 1

    Well, it's stuck on my Dad's Pentium 166 (and his 386SX; the P166 was a Father's day 1999 present in order to get him out of DOS 3.3). That was a great program for its time. I don't know what good it'll do to have a text-mode word processor, but go ahead and try porting it.

    --
    "Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
    1. Re:Dude, I still HAVE WP51 for DOS! by frank249 · · Score: 1
      Since I don't throw anything away, I still have a copy of WP 4.2 for DOS. I used to run it on an XT with 2 360k floppies and no hard drive. Now you can fit the whole thing with speller and thesaurus on on 1.4 meg floppy and still have room for lots of files.

      --

      Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.

  5. portability by rixdaffy · · Score: 2

    I don't think WP5.1 is very portable...
    If i'm not mistaken, it was written mainly in x86 assembly code (I could be wrong... I remember hearing about that though)... so making it in portable C code is just like rewriting it entirely...

    Ricardo.

    1. Re:portability by multriha · · Score: 1

      Portable? i don't know, but no way it's written mainly in ASM

  6. included in WordPerfect 8 for UNIX by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3

    It's included in Corel WordPerfect 8 for UNIX bundle. The side of the box reports support for HP UX 10.20 9000 700/800, IBM AIX 4.1.4 (PPC and RS6000), Linux, SCO OpenServer 5.0.0, Sun Solaris 2.5.1 (SPARC), and Sun Solaris 2.5.1 (x86). Text mode requirements: 2MB memory for the first user, 1MB for each add'l user; 31-40MB of hard disk space.

  7. URL on Corel's website by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    More information about WordPerfect 8 for UNIX is at http://www.corel.com/wpunix/.

  8. It does exist, however..... by R3 · · Score: 1

    This post prompted me to do some digging, since I also remember text-based version of WP for Linux. The only difference is that I remember it as version 7, or maybe 8, not 5.1...anyhow....

    ...apparently, WP console *IS* alive and well, but looks like you'll have to pay for it, most likely a lot. Corel sells something called "Corel® WordPerfect® 8 for Linux® (Retail Server Edition" that includes what you need : "Corel WordPerfect 8 for Linux Character Terminal Binary for non-GUI terminal users". I found this on their official web page at:
    http://linux.corel.com/products/wp8/features.htm#b reakdown

    I also tried to find some (any) references to pricing for this beast, to no avail - it is conspicuously missing from price lists for all the retailers and resellers I could think of (including Ingram Micro's)...

    What to do? The best bet is probably to wait out until Corel officially embraces MS .NET and abandons their Linux strategy and see what happens...they'll either dump WP Linux altogether, give it out for free or something similar, so you (we) will be able to pick up the pieces and make it work the way you want to...:)

    Hope this helps, as bleak as it may sound.

    1. Re:It does exist, however..... by frank249 · · Score: 2
      You can order WordPerfect 7 for unix from Amazon and the details are here.

      System requirements:

      X Window System:

      9 MB RAM for first user; 2.5 MB for each additional user

      43 to 103 MB hard disk space, depending on platform and installation options

      Character Terminals: 2 MB RAM for first user; 1.5 MB for each additional user

      31 to 40 MB hard disk space, depending on platform and installation options

      --

      Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.

    2. Re:It does exist, however..... by Chris+Hiner · · Score: 1

      Long ago, I remember people using special statically linked SCO binaries of WP and the iBCS support in Linux to run WP under Linux... I seem to remember someone figuring out that they sold more copies of WP for SCO to be used under Linux, than they sold to use under SCO...

  9. Was in Server edition of WP7 and WP8 Unix by Alan+Shutko · · Score: 4

    The character mode client was included in the server editions of WP7/Unix and WP8/Unix. It was essentially WP5.1/Unix, updated to read files and try to do stuff with them. It might still be available, as Corel never did WP9 for anything but Linux. However, don't expect any support on it... the company who did the work on those versions is no longer working on it.