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Game of Thrones Author George R R Martin Writes with WordStar on DOS
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes: "Ryan Reed reports that when most Game of Thrones fans imagine George R.R. Martin writing his epic fantasy novels, they probably picture the author working on a futuristic desktop (or possibly carving his words onto massive stones like the Ten Commandments). But the truth is that Martin works on an outdated DOS machine using '80s word processor WordStar 4.0, as he revealed during an interview on Conan. 'I actually like it,' says Martin. 'It does everything I want a word processing program to do, and it doesn't do anything else. I don't want any help. I hate some of these modern systems where you type a lower case letter and it becomes a capital letter. I don't want a capital. If I wanted a capital, I would have typed a capital. I know how to work the shift key.' 'I actually have two computers,' Martin continued. 'I have a computer I browse the Internet with and I get my email on, and I do my taxes on. And then I have my writing computer, which is a DOS machine, not connected to the Internet.'"
Douglas Adams typed on an Apple IIe. Many authors bring typewriters or other dummy typing devices with them somewhere so they can remove external influences and distractions during their writing time
Wordstar probably has it's own swap file. Most of the heavy-duty DOS word processors did.
640k stopped being a real limitation with DOS 5.0 and the EMS/XMS standards. As long as the words and interface elements currently on the screen fit into 640k, you are fine. Also, if you are in a text-only mode (with a flashing square for a mouse cursor), there are memory hacks that can give you up to 720k of conventional ram, at the expense of losing all graphics ability.
So when a user who doesn't know what they want copies a temporary password from an email and pastes it in to a login form is supposed to know to remove the trailing space the Microsoft software so helpfully included?
Or when you've gone to the pain of selecting only the word and not the trailing space, then select part of another word to paste over, it helpfully inserts a space that you must then delete.
I'm so glad I don't know what I want.
This should be a clue to everyone how important ease of use is. I know that skilled computer users love following 5 pages of directions linked between 8 different websites written by 4 different people to accomplish 1 simple task (looking at you Linux), but for most people, that's a pain in the ass.
Name 1 way to back up her emails and pictures on a remote server that requires fewer mouse clicks than forwarding them herself with email. "I've tried to explain how things should be done" -- first rule of UI design, "don't make me think".