Making mail manageable and more: WordStar - Software Review - WordStar 7.0 word processing software - Evaluation

Home Office Computing, Oct, 1992 by Lisa Kleinholz

AT A GLANCE: New version of old-standby word processor; great mail list and mail merge. New macro system; mouse support; improved page preview; graphics import; file conversion; communications module; multifunction calculator; font management; great pull-down menus and more. DOCUMENTATION: Excellent; ample, readable manuals; good on-line help. EASE OF USE: Very good. Given the complexity of the program, the learning curve, while steep, is made easier by good documentation and menus. SUPPORT: Free, but it's your nickel. Phone number, (812) 323-0069, was nowhere to be found in the manual but was instead printed on a small, easy-to-lose card.

VERSION REVIEWED: 7.0 LIST PRICE: $495 STREET PRICE RANGE: $256-$300 SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: 512K IBM compatible (640K recommended); graphics card (CGA, EGA, VGA, super VGA, and Hercules); DOS 3.0 or higher; telecommunication requires Hayescompatible modem up to 2,400 baud PUBLISHER: WordStar International, 201 Alameda del Prado, P.O. Box 6113, Novato, CA 94948; (415) 382-8000, (800) 227-5609 WordStar users will fall in love all over again with this old favorite wrapped up in a shiny new package. A smorgasbord of features and new and improved pull-down menus in addition to the familiar commands make this upgraded version of WordStar very attractive.

It's in mail. One of the best features of WordStar 7.0 is the way it handles mailings and form letters. I keep many different mailing lists in a mini-database with an easy-touse, predefined entry form, which includes space for user-defined fields and remarks. Once I have a mailing list, creating a form letter is a snap. The menus and manual are so accessible that anyone who can type can get the program to work the first time through. I use filters, so, for example, I can send letters to specific cities or states. Also included is an inventory format with fields for item numbers, quantities, prices, and so on.

The manual guided me through such potentially tricky feats as printing labels and envelopes for mass mailings, writing contracts with boilerplate from a "library of standard paragraphs," and using mail merge with calculations to create billing documents. Needless to say, these are great features for anyone running a small business and may eliminate the need for a separate mailing list or database program.

But that's not all. Page preview is another strong point. I especially liked the multiplepage option that allowed me to view 10 pages to check for overall layout. Zooming in for a close-up took but a mouse click.

Other features I found impressive were paragraph-style selection from the menu, fonts including PostScript, and a wide selection of file imports from all major word processors, spreadsheets, databases, and graphics formats, including Macintosh files. Add to this footnotes, endnotes, indexing, tables of contents, recordable and editable macros, and chain printing--all accessible through the menus--and you've got a workable word processor.

On the down side .... WordStar is still a bit clunky. The file-conversion and mailing-list features are separate add-on programs, and moving back and forth is somewhat clumsy. And there are still those dot commands, used for page formatting, and control-keystroke combinations still lurking in the background; I found their very presence off-putting. The program moves quickly enough for most uses, but it's not as fast as the industry leaders XvWrite and WordPerfect for DOS. Instead of automatically adjusting on-screen to any layout changes you make, WordStar forces you to issue a reformat command, which worked rather slowly through the 35-page document I used as a test.

Probably the biggest deficiency is the number of document windows that can be opened at one time---only two. Since I regularly use four or five when 1'm writing, I found this limitation daunting.

1he verdict. To sum up, WordStar 7.0 is just a hair short of being competitive with the best text-based word processors on the market. If you need a very good word processor with mailing-list and mail-merge features, check it out. If you're already a WordStar user, an upgrade is well worth the price for the added features and the face-lift.

--LISA KLEINHOLZ