Word Processor History

Word Up!

TEXTVERABEITUNG

This is the German word coined by IBM engineer Ulrich Steinhilper to describe the machines they were developing in the 1950s. Eventually IBM settled on ‘word processing,’ meaning, “to describe electronic ways of handling a standard set of office activities; composing, revising, printing, and filing written documents."

A Room Full Of Stuff

Originally, word processing referred to a whole line of machines developed by the IBM Company in the early sixties. Although one could also take the history back to the development of the printing press by Gutenberg, for the sake of brevity we will start in the early sixties.

The first example of a computer type word processor is the Friden Flexowriter. The Flexowriter used a paper tape in order to reproduce parts of letters that remained the same from recipient to recipient while leaving the operator to finish the document by personalizing it.

Wang Laboratories introduced the first widely used word processor that incorporated a screen upon which the text could be edited. This was a machine that used all of the familiar functions that we view as constituting a word processor today. The Wang machine was very dependable and saw wide acceptance in both small business and large industry. So reliable were the machines that many office workers continued to use them until the late nineties.

The Wang machine heralded the leap from big, awkward, dedicated machines with awkward paper or magnetic tape mechanisms to the modern computer/ printer combo that we enjoy today. We must not forget, however, that several of the technologies we enjoy as a given today were once major celebrated innovations in the computer industry. Xerox introduced the ability to work on multiple documents.

Virtually Delicious

Now, when we refer to word processors we mean the software that runs on a computer rather than the machine itself. Before the personal computer, language specific programs such as Japanese, Bengali or Chinese word processors were too difficult to develop typewriting machines for. The Chinese even developed a new alphabet so they could adapt their language to simplify the task of creating documents.

Word processors have become so ubiquitous that we sometimes aren’t even aware of the presence of online word processors embedded in free email sites and blogging applications.By moving many functions to the software, companies such as Microsoft and Corell began releasing “office suites.” These not only processed word but also crunched numbers.

One of the more familiar and oft used of these is Microsoft Word Processor in conjunction with Outlook presentation software. Now one can create a presentation with visuals that can also be transferred to an audience handout..