
A Brief History of ClarisWorks (2003) - WoodenChair
http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/bob/clarisworks.php
======
linguae
I have fond memories of ClarisWorks in elementary school. My elementary school
in the 1990s had a bunch of Apple Macintosh Performa 575 and 580 machines
running Mac OS 7.5; the school still had them as late as 2001 when I completed
sixth grade. At the earlier grade levels we learned typing (using "All the
Right Type") and LOGO programming, and starting around fourth grade we learned
how to write basic reports using ClarisWorks' word processor. I am also
familiar with the drawing tool that is part of ClarisWorks.

I've been collecting classic Macs for the past 16 years, ever since one of my
teachers gave me a Macintosh SE and a Performa 6220. Every now and then I boot
one of my classic Macs and open up ClarisWorks. One of the things I like about
most software written for the classic Mac OS is their strict adherence to the
Apple Macintosh Human Interface Guidelines.

Maybe it's just the nostalgia talking, but Apple Pages and Apple Numbers do
not spark the same joy in me that ClarisWorks did, though Apple Keynote is a
superb software product. I've tried using Apple Pages and Apple Numbers in the
past, and I often end up resorting to LibreOffice, despite the fact that
LibreOffice's interface isn't Mac-like while Pages and Numbers are first-party
programs. It's hard for me to articulate this objectively, but Pages and
Numbers seem to deviate from the traditional UI for word processors and
spreadsheets, respectively, and I'm just more comfortable with more
traditional word processors like ClarisWorks/AbiWord/Microsoft
Word/LibreOffice Writer and traditional spreadsheets like Microsoft
Excel/Gnumeric/LibreOffice Calc. I've tried Pages and Numbers, but I find
myself reaching for LibreOffice.

Perhaps it would be nice if somebody created a modern-day ClarisWorks as a
type of counter-weight to Microsoft Office and LibreOffice.

~~~
wsc981
I kinda like the UI of Nisus Writer [0], prefer it over Microsoft Office and
Pages. It's kinda basic which to me kinda evokes the ClarisWorks feeling.

Sadly, the Microsoft Office import / export has never been great when I used
this app (perhaps improved now?). And sadly many companies still rely on
Office, so compatibility is kind of a must.

\---

[0]: [https://www.nisus.com](https://www.nisus.com)

~~~
EricE
WriteNow was even less bloated than Nisus Writer. I was thrilled when they
added style sheets and then stopped. Well, I think they stopped more from
going out of business but it was the right balance between lightweight yet
usefull for moderately complex documents.

Yup, word is a beast but if you have a large, complex, structured/technical
document it's pretty hard to beat. Once I learned just how easy section
references were I would never do a contract in anything else. You mean as I
move sections around all my references automatically update when I update the
table of contents? Yes please!

------
makecheck
This was in a category of good software that doesn’t exist much today, and you
just know it when you experience it.

Apps like this were filled with features that don’t fit into regular marketing
bullet points but were evidence of care and attention. I used the graphics
module all the time and it had some great ones. Example: I would select an
object, copy it, paste it, then immediately move the pasted object; then, when
I pasted the object a second time, _ClarisWorks moved the new one for me by
the same relative amount_. That turned a tedious layout task into exactly what
I wanted, in seconds.

And of course “any kind of document frame anywhere” was unbelievable at the
time.

Today, when I think of just the time I spend with something like the fiddly
and frustrating text selection mechanism on iOS (that I used to write this
comment), we have lost something as an industry. Software can be a _craft_ ,
not just something you slap together.

~~~
EricE
Ugh - text selection is what drove me back to a MacBook Air from my iPad Pro.
Now that they have tablet support I should really give it a try, but on the
other hand I just can't be bothered. Multitasking/app switching is so much
easier on macOS for me too.

Maybe of Apple finally figures out how they want multitasking to work on iPad
OS and stops changing it, it would be worth giving it another solid try - but
I'm not yet convinced it's worth it.

------
valuearb
Apple still has a Vancouver office and it’s still responsible for some of its
consumer software. Not sure, but I believe Numbers and Pages?

Also one correction. MacWrite Pro wasn’t held up by stringent quality control,
it was held up by a poor architecture. The project lead told me all document
state was stored in globals with unrestricted access. Fixing a bug in one area
frequently created a bug elsewhere.

I worked on the windows version of ClarisWorks. I remember the Vancouver boys
were really focused, they were the most hard edged, hard driving team at
Claris, which I found refreshing.

~~~
Doctor_Fegg
MacWrite Pro was a UI dream though. Slow as molasses, but so intuitive. You
could do serious page layout on it with ease. One of the best designed pieces
of software I’ve ever used.

~~~
EricE
Especially compared to Word in the same era. In fact that infamous screen shot
where the toolbars take up 90% of the screen was Mac Word 5.

I should get the IIfx out and see if it still boots :p

------
csa
I trained 100s of people on ClarisWorks in the 90s. It was absolutely amazing,
and it just worked. The elegance and the simplicity were second to none. It
was so good that I was able to turn folks who didn’t know how to use a mouse
into CW power users in 2-3 months. It was like magic.

I had the privilege of being in the same Go club in Boston with Bob around
99-02, and I have to say that he’s also a super nice guy. He told me this
story f2f during that time, and I’m glad to see that he documented it for
posterity’s sake.

Starting a tech biz is _so_ much easier today.

------
smallstepforman
I actually purchased GoBe Productive 2 for BeOS R5, and version 3 for Windows
a couple of years later. It was my default office app for most of the decade.
It’s a pity that the source is lost, because it was a nicer app than
StarOffice at the time (IMHO) and it might have survived in an open source
format.

~~~
cbm-vic-20
That must have been one of the very few commercial apps for BeOS.

~~~
memsom
One, but there were others. Moho comes to mind, but there were others such as
Tune Tracker.. there was at least one DAW that came with BeOS and a custom app
to run the hardware too. There were a few games.. Chorum 3 is one I have a
copy of. There was a version of the Opera browser at one point too.

------
uxp100
So they really wanted to call their product "something"works. Is that just
because it was a Microsoft Works competitor, or was there other software using
"Works" to refer to integrated office software?

Also, I see a lot of places describing the Claris offices as 6 miles from
Apple HQ, probably all from this source. Where was it exactly? I'd imagine in
that commercial area in Sunnyvale and north Santa Clara, but I've biked around
that area many times and never noticed a "wedge."

~~~
mrpippy
AppleWorks started on the Apple II in 1984. Microsoft Works apparently was
originally written by the same engineer after he left Apple (!!) but then
licensed it to Microsoft, it came out in 1987.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Works](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Works)

------
calf
I remember the database records feature that let you lay out the design of
records in an intuitive way, even though I was too young to use it for
anything! I haven't been able to find anything like it since. The other
feature I used a lot was outlining, the WYISWYG Mac philosophy was great for
preparing printed pages of notes.

------
rckoepke
ClarisWorks generally got UI features for new OS-supported features very early
relative to other default apps. Despite being ostenibly a word processor,
ClarisWorks was the first tool I was able to use for ripping songs from CD's.

------
nkoren
I barely used ClarisWorks, but was very familiar with its BeOS-based
successor, Gobe Productive. It was an _incredible_ application; I used it as
my primary office suite for years. It was just so well-integrated and
thoughtfully designed; I have yet to see its equal.

Whether this kind of brilliant integration and thoughtfulness is something
that could carry over to the kind of comprehensive feature sets of Microsoft
Office or Libre Office is a valid question. My hunch is that it could. I wish
somebody would try.

~~~
simtel20
Gobe was independent of the beos and had a windows and linux offering, but
only had a small team out of portland in the late 90s and never had the
success it deserved.

------
js2
For those that are curious, Bob Hearn is now a pretty successful ultra runner.
He seems to especially enjoy multi-day events. I met him at a 100 miler in NC
a few years ago.

[https://www.irunfar.com/2020/02/age-old-runners-bob-
hearn.ht...](https://www.irunfar.com/2020/02/age-old-runners-bob-hearn.html)

He blogs about his running these days here:

[https://bobhearn.blogspot.com](https://bobhearn.blogspot.com)

------
bachmeier
Haven't thought about AppleWorks in a long time. I followed a pretty common
path for the time. AppleWorks in high school. Went to college, where everyone
used WordPerfect combined with Lotus 1-2-3 or Quattro Pro. Then MS Office came
bundled with Windows so that was what everyone used, in spite of Excel being a
flaming pile of [...].

~~~
mementomori
I remember using Lotus at home. My uncle was a programmer and he taught me how
to use the command line and Lotus. Also remember using Logo, drawing some
shapes with the turtle.

------
ThePowerOfFuet
>(1969)

This seems to be a bug:

>Copyright © 1969 Robert A. Hearn

>Last Modified: December 31, 1969 Open of lock file "/HITS/.lck" failed.

It states clearly at the top that it was written in 2003.

~~~
baddox
Perhaps the footer is a joke, as if the true timestamp failed to load but was
interpreted as Unix timestamp zero in a different time zone?

------
networkimprov
> _Note: this page was written in early 2003._

~~~
pmiller2
>Copyright © 1969 Robert A. Hearn

>Last Modified: December 31, 1969

Lol, this must be autogenerated. A timestamp of 0 will fall on 1969-12-31 for
many time zones.

What I wonder is why the author added this note, and didn't get the code that
generates this fixed.

------
ht85
> 1969

Nice.

My career started around age 10, as I published my first page online. It was
built on a pirated copy of Claris HomePage. Thanks, Claris!

~~~
geerlingguy
I built my first site (about five pages, mostly sharing some family pictures
I’d scanned in on my dad’s fancy color SCSI scanner) in Claris HomePage, and
put it on a Whistle InterJet that had a static public IP address.

Back then domain names were something like $80 or $100, so I decided to forego
a domain and use the IP. The site didn’t get much traffic besides my own
visits!

