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A Last Look at ApplixWare
Linux.com (Also owned by VA) is taking a look at the once widely popular office suite, ApplixWare. From the article: "Passed to a subsidiary of Applix called VistaSource that later became independent, ApplixWare was repositioned as a combination of a basic office package and a developer's toolkit running from a common main menu. For a while, it was even renamed AnyWare. Now at version 6, ApplixWare is back to its original name, with versions available for AIX, GNU/Linux, and SPARC Solaris, with earlier versions still supported for Windows and FreeBSD. The trial download for GNU/Linux shows ApplixWare's age, but it also shows a trick or two that its newer rivals might learn from."
I noticed some time ago that the PowerPC Linux version of ApplixWare had been dropped. Getting them to port to LinuxPPC was a point of pride for me, and the product of my work with ApplixWare's Richard Manly. (Where are you, brother?) It sold fairly well by our standards, and assuming you've still got a LinuxPPC box, ApplixWare 4 is still a very usable package. (I don't know why you would, but you could. ;-)
Much to my surprise, my old comrade señor Carro declared PowerPC dead after our little adventure collapsed, which happened after I left, leaving him alone on the sinking ship. In realistic terms, with Apple's switch to Intel processors, he's right. There's still lots to do with embedded and server PPC, though. Good luck whoever's still working on it; nods to Cort, Ben H, Paul M, Gary T, Dan B and K.S.
-- haaz.
Man, the ApplixWare I used (vintage 1998 or so) made Office 97 look stable. I liked it otherwise, though.
The original company, Applix, has gone through some interesting transformations. After ApplixWare, it focused on CRM for awhile, but has since returned to focusing exclusively on TM1, its OLAP database. Once upon a time, you could buy TM1 for Linux for $100; now, licensing a TM1 server cost 5 figures and the primary platform is Windows (I think there is still some development for HP-UX and maybe one other Unixy platform). It's pricey and somewhat buggy, but has some OLAP capabilities (speed, flexibility, Excel integration) that make it unique.
There's an open-source project PALO with similar features that looks promising. It went 1.0 about a month ago.
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Print to Postscript, display directly or as PDF. I use some older DOS DTP apps (running under Windows), mostly I work in their own interface, but instead of printing to the actual printer to check layout I do PDF proofs most of the time now; simple enough to automate this.