Editing WordStar (section)

===Early success===
WordStar was the first microcomputer word processor to offer [[mail merge]] and textual [[WYSIWYG]]. Besides word-wrapping (still a notable feature for early microcomputer programs), this last was most noticeably implemented as on-screen pagination during the editing session.  Using the number of lines-per-page given by the user during program installation, WordStar would display a full line of dash characters onscreen showing where page breaks would occur during hardcopy printout. Many users found this very reassuring during editing, knowing beforehand where pages would end and begin, and where text would thus be interrupted across pages.

Barnaby left the company in March 1980, but due to WordStar's sophistication, the company's extensive sales and marketing efforts, and bundling deals with [[Osborne Computer Corporation|Osborne]] and other computer makers, MicroPro's sales grew from {{US$|long=no|500000}} in 1979 to {{US$|long=no|72}} million in [[fiscal year]] 1984, surpassing earlier market leader [[Electric Pencil]]. By May 1983 ''[[Byte (magazine)|BYTE]]'' magazine called WordStar "without a doubt the best-known and probably the most widely used personal computer word-processing program". The company released '''WordStar 3.3''' in June 1983; the 650,000 cumulative copies of WordStar for the [[IBM PC]] and other computers sold by that fall was more than double that of the second most-popular word processor, and that year MicroPro had 10% of the personal computer software market. By 1984, the year it held an [[initial public offering]], MicroPro was the world's largest software company with 23% of the word processor market.{{r|bergin2006}}<ref name="arredondo19840326">{{cite magazine | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lC4EAAAAMBAJ&q=%22wordstar+3.3%22&pg=PA66 | title=Review: WordStar 3.3 | access-date=March 6, 2011 | author=Arredondo, Larry | date=March 26, 1984| magazine=InfoWorld | page=66}}</ref><ref name="shuford198305">{{cite news | url=https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1983-05/1983_05_BYTE_08-05_The_Electronic_Office#page/n181/mode/2up | title=Word Tools for the IBM Personal Computer | work=BYTE | date=May 1983 | access-date=October 19, 2013 | author=Shuford, Richard S. | pages=176}}</ref>

[[File:Wordstar 4 CPM.jpg|thumb|Distribution  {{convert|5+1/4|in|adj=on}} diskettes and packaging for the last version  (Version 4) of WordStar released for 8-bit CP/M]]

A manual that ''[[PC Magazine]]'' described as "incredibly inadequate"<ref name="cowan198208">{{cite news | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WYnHD9WSWdAC&pg=PA150 | title=A Usable WordStar Manual is Born | work=PC Magazine | date=August 1982 | access-date=October 21, 2013 | author=Cowan, Les | pages=150}}</ref> and "a looseleaf nightmare"{{r|manes198306}} led many authors to publish replacements. One of them, ''Introduction to WordStar'', was written by future [[Goldstein & Blair]] founder and [[Whole Earth Software Catalog]] contributor Arthur Naiman, who hated the program and had a term inserted into his publishing contract that he not be required to use WordStar to write the book,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/Whole_Earth_Software_Catalog_for_1986_1985_Point|title=Whole Earth Software Catalog|year=1989 |isbn=9780385233019 |last1=Brand |first1=Stewart |publisher=Quantum Press/Doubleday }} "In my estimation, WORDSTAR is one of the most poorly designed word-processing programs ever written— a huge, elaborate farrago of klugy patches, sort of like a Rube Goldberg machine gone berserk.... one of my requirements before signing the contract was that I wouldn't have to use WORDSTAR to write the book."</ref> using WRITE instead.<ref name="pournelle198503">{{cite news | url=https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1985-03-rescan/1985_03_BYTE_10-03_Bargain_Computing#page/n325/mode/2up | title=On the Road: Hackercon and COMDEX | work=BYTE | date=March 1985 | access-date=March 19, 2016 | author=Pournelle, Jerry | pages=313}}</ref>