I still maintain that the 1986 Commodore 128DCR is the best 8-bit computer Commodore ever made: built-in 1571 disk drive, burst mode serial, detachable keyboard, 2MHz operation, separate 40 and 80 column video, CP/M option, a powerful native mode, full Commodore 64 compatibility and no external power brick. But when the O.G. "flat" 128 was coming to market in 1985 Commodore really wanted it to be the business computer the 64 wasn't (and prior efforts like Magic Desk and Plus/4 3+1 didn't help). Unfortunately for Commodore, it would still be at least a year before the sophisticated GUI of Berkeley Softworks' GEOS arrived on the 64 and another year after that for the native 128 version, so to jump-start the productivity side, the management in West Chester contracted with a small Michigan company to port their Apple II software suite to the new machine — which Commodore then sold under their own name. That company was Arktronics, led by Howard Marks and Bobby Kotick — the very same names later at Activision — and the software package was Jane.
I never used Jane myself back in the day, or for that matter any 128 native word processor, and even when we got a 128 I still wrote my term papers in Pocket Writer 64 or Timeworks Word Writer. However, that faulty but repairable Australian Commodore 128DCR I got last Christmas came with a big box of software and in there was a complete copy of Jane 128 along with the data disk the previous owners' family had used. They were delighted when I said I wanted to take a whack at converting their files as a thank you — and along the way we'll take a look at Jane's oddball history, the original Apple II version, the Commodore 128 version and its all-but-unknown port to the French Thomson MO5, plus those other attempts at productivity applications Commodore tried in the mid-1980s.
PETs, of course, had many productivity software options and even the VIC-20, if suitably upgraded, could manage basic tasks. Some small businesses reportedly even used them for simple finances. The 64 itself was hardly an ideal productivity machine when introduced in 1982, but it was certainly far more up to the task than the VIC-20 was and many such software packages were naturally available later on. Initially, however, dealers and customers openly groused about the absence of a spreadsheet or even a word processor, much to Commodore chief Jack Tramiel's profound displeasure. The task of rectifying this situation was handed to executive Sigmund Hartmann and his recently consolidated Commodore Software division, formed in April 1983 from the prior two separate software units handling system software (under Paul Goheen) and games (under Bill Wade).
At least one side project would become critical to the reworked division. Engineer John Feagans had been the initial developer of the PET Kernal, its internal ROM-based operating system, which pioneered the then-novel idea of separating I/O and other system routines from the built-in Microsoft BASIC. (Prior versions of BASIC on early microcomputers often simply drove devices directly.) Feagans' innovation facilitated the use of these routines by user-written machine language programs through a standardized jump table, which was reused and greatly expanded by Bob Russell for the VIC-20 and 64.
Feagans' side project was a PET demonstration of a small picture-based file manager, using an office filing cabinet as its central metaphor and drawn with PETSCII graphic characters. In 1982 the Commodore office in Moorpark, California where Feagans worked was closed and he was reassigned to their then-executive offices in Santa Clara. With little else to do at the time, Feagans rewrote his file cabinet demo for the new 64 to get familiar with the hardware, primarily in BASIC. As an exploration of the 64's joystick and moveable sprite capabilities, he additionally implemented an animated "hand" controlled by the joystick that served as a pointer. By this time Hartmann had just weeks until Summer CES in June 1983, the deadline he had promised Tramiel. While working on licensing deals with outside firms, Hartmann also ordered Andy Finkel, promoted from the VIC team to technical manager, to find anything the software division was already working on that could get finished fast. Finkel saw Feagans' new demo and convinced Hartmann that it was both feasible and viable as a product.
Magic Desk was completed by Feagans, Finkel and other Commodore developers at record speed, recruiting resources from Rich Wiggins' speech group in Dallas, Texas and marketing and documentation head Michael Tomczyk, who in turn brought in artist and programmer Jeff Bruette to develop the sprite-based icons and additional PETSCII backgrounds. With time being a severely limited resource, after completion of the typewriter and filing cabinet it was instead decided that this Magic Desk would be the first of a whole line of Magic Desk software between which data could be exchanged. This was Magic Desk I: Type & File, and it made it to CES along with almost 70 other programs for the 64 and VIC-20. "We want everyone to know that Commodore's in the software business," Hartmann declared to COMPUTE!'s Gazette.
Like many Commodore Software titles Magic Desk was released on cartridge, a wise decision as it started up within seconds, and its interface was colourful, audacious and unlike anything else at that year's CES. (At the time Feagans claimed never to have seen the Apple Lisa or Xerox PARC machines when he developed it, though his recollection later varied.) As a result it quickly overshadowed the software division's other C64 productivity titles licensed from outside companies, such as Easy Script from British developer Precision Software Ltd which débuted at the same show.
When it eventually emerged for sale in the fall, however, reviewers were somewhat less enamoured. Although the user-friendly appearance was praised, RUN found the hand pointer difficult to manipulate and complained "the Help screens [were] little or no help," and Ahoy! noted the file cabinet required a disk drive and the questionable use of RELative files for storage, slowing access and hampering interchange. Reviewers also were quick to notice the icons for later planned Magic Desk modules, nevertheless already on the desktop yet programmed to do absolutely nothing. But the most unanimous and direct criticism came for what few built-in applications there were, especially the centrepiece typewriter which was seen as limited and idiosyncratic — and moreso given Magic Desk initially sold for $71.95 (in 2025 dollars over $230) at a time when other, better and often cheaper options had since become available, including from Commodore themselves. InfoWorld was the harshest of its detractors, concluding, "We really question whether Commodore's approach with Magic Desk is the best way to develop 'people literacy.'"
Part of this cost was the expense of manufacture. Magic Desk initially came as 32K of ROM in four 8K chips, quite possibly the largest cartridge developed for the 64 at that time and requiring additional logic on the PCB for bank switching. (Its design is still used to this day for large multicarts, now supporting as much as a megabyte of ROM.) Internally, although some code had been converted to machine language using a custom compiler, there wasn't enough time to do it all and a fair portion of Magic Desk thus remained written in BASIC (moved up to start at $0a01 instead of $0801). As part of initialization this BASIC program is read out of the ROMs and copied to RAM for execution, which is the slight pause at the beginning before the title screen appears.
Despite the cool press reception, Magic Desk sold surprisingly well to new 64 users, and in numbers sufficient to solve its production problems such that its price dropped in half by late 1984. Sales were enough to propose an upgraded version called Magic Desk II for Commodore's new (and, ultimately to its detriment, incompatible) 264 series, capable of speech prompts when paired with the speech group's Magic Voice synthesizer hardware, and featuring a more sophisticated interface with "Lisa-like" pulldown menus and icons.
At the same time the software division finished the remaining pieces of the original 64 Magic Desk (now simply called "The Magic Desk"), also with speech capability; the screenshots here of the presumably completed budget and phone modules are from prototype ROMs in an auction lot of Feagans' old Commodore memorabilia, double the size of the original version.
Commodore intended the upper-tier 264s to be home and small business productivity systems, designing their hardware and TED video chip to match, with the 64 remaining as their general purpose gaming and home computer. Tramiel strongly believed, as Michael Tomczyk wrote in The Home Computer Wars, that "home computers would have the power of small business computers like IBM and Apple — but would be priced like home computers, perhaps as low as under $500." Smaller versions of the 264, with their much lower part counts, could even compete in the ultra-low market segment against systems like the ZX series in the UK.
As Hartmann, Tomczyk and others in the software group felt the 264 would be most meaningful with built-in software, Magic Desk II became one of several possible option ROMs representing potential machine configurations, along with others featuring different programming languages or applications like a spreadsheet or terminal program. Tramiel embraced the idea, seeing it as a car with different models "just like General Motors." At least three "flavours," aligning with the internal groups in the software division (business, home and education), were envisioned — though the concept also met swift resistance from dealers and even Commodore's own sales team who protested having to handle multiple different versions of one computer. (One possible unspoken reason is that it was already known not to be 64 compatible, and dealers were undoubtedly unhappy about taking stock space away from a financial anchor.)
With time yet again a factor, for the top-end "business flavour" the software division looked for a quick potential port and found it in Trilogy, a forthcoming 64 software package from Orange County, California-based Tri Micro demonstrated at Spring Comdex 1983.
Trilogy was to be a combination of three existing Tri Micro programs, Your Home Office (word processor and spreadsheet) and The Write File (word processor and database) merged into a single application, and Plus Graph (charting) — what would have been called "integrated software" in those days. Commodore contracted with David Johnson, its developer and Tri Micro's VP of software engineering, to also port it to the 264.
In January 1984 Jack Tramiel was forced out of the company he founded by chairman Irving Gould and shortly thereafter the 264 line was slashed by new CEO Marshall Smith. Three models were chosen from the various prototypes and experiments, the 16K 16 (and in Europe the 116 as well) to serve as the low-end, and the 64K 264, now renamed the Plus/4, as the high-end. Both the completed Magic Desk and Magic Desk II were cut, as was the education flavour based on a built-in Logo implementation. Only the Plus/4 would offer Trilogy, renamed to 3-Plus-1, and its ROM size was cut to 32K to reduce production costs further which in turn forced Johnson to make serious reductions in functionality. As a result 3-Plus-1 became nearly as maligned as the Plus/4 itself (mocked in the press as the "Minus/60" for its idiosyncrasies, deliberately incompatible ports and lack of 64 software compatibility), though yours truly actually used the spreadsheet for a household budget when I was a starving student, and it wasn't that bad.
Nevertheless, as evidence of the hasty last-minute switch, the Plus/4 manual still makes vague reference to "built-in software packages," saying the computer will tell you "which packages are available and which function key to use to activate them." There was only ever one in the production model, and it was 3+1. As Tri-Micro had still maintained the rights, Trilogy was subsequently released in its original form for the 64 as Team-Mate to the rave reviews 3-Plus-1 never got (in July 1985 RUN called it "a high-performance program that Commodore users will discover to be one of the best available"). Johnson later got his chance to show what 3+1 was really capable of with Plus/Extra, a full disk version sold by Tri Micro, but it lacked the close integration of both Team-Mate and 3+1 and ended up tainted in the market by its predecessor. Commodore never adopted it.
The failure of the Plus/4 to succeed the 64, much less overtake it, demonstrated clearly to Commodore management that 64 compatibility was essential in their next computer. Around this same time Sig Hartmann had noted the success of Atari's own first-party software unit Atarisoft on non-Atari platforms (though AtariLab was developed externally), even for the 64, and said there were similar plans to port Commodore first-party software and licenses to the Apple II, IBM PC and PCjr. (NARRATOR: This didn't happen.) However, by mid-1984 the software division had also developed a reputation for poor quality, with Scott Mace commenting in InfoWorld that — hits like International Soccer notwithstanding — "so far, the normal standard for Commodore software is mediocrity." In the meantime, Tramiel had bought the ailing Atari from Warner Communications and lured several Commodore managers, including Hartmann (who was already in conflict with Smith over cuts to the software division), to defect. Paul Goheen, the former systems software group head, became the new software chief.
As the Commodore 128 neared completion, management constructed a new sales strategy to put it head to head against the Apple IIc and PCjr in specialty stores as well as Tramiel's favoured mass market retailers. To more plausibly bill it as a productivity machine, once again the software division had to look outside the company.
Arktronics started in the dorms of the University of Michigan as a partnership between sophomore Robert "Bobby" Kotick and junior Howard Marks, who were then roommates. "We knew that unlike other industries," said Kotick in a 1984 interview, "there was a place for 19 and 20 year olds [in computers]." In July 1983 the company was formed to capitalize on Marks' ideas to envision a friendlier user interface for productivity applications. Marks, who was French, had previously worked for Apple and had access to its peripherals, including the then-novel use of a mouse as a pointer device. "This was way before there was ever a Lisa," Kotick added. "We realized that the biggest problem was that people like us couldn't use these things [computers] yet because they were too difficult and time-consuming to learn." They crafted a wish list and design document oriented to systems with 64K of RAM or less but featuring a picture (now we'd say icon-based) interface driven by a pointing device, such as a joystick or mouse, and an extensive on-line tutorial.
Marks and Kotick hired students and even lured away some professors to work on the application, christened Jane after the Dick and Jane introductory reading books, who accepted shares in the company in lieu of salary. To fund development by their team of about thirty, Kotick tagged along with a friend to the annual Cattle Baron's Ball in Dallas at which he met real estate and casino investor Steve Wynn. Kotick managed to hitch a ride back to the East Coast on Wynn's plane where he pitched him on their company and Wynn encouraged him to write up a business plan. Three months later Marks and Kotick were summoned to Wynn's offices in Manhattan and flown to Atlantic City, whereupon Wynn handed them a cheque for $300,000 (in 2025 approximately $970,000) in exchange for a third of the company, providing business advice as the product progressed.
Jane missed a first deadline for Comdex in December 1983 due to testing delays and finally launched at Softcon in February 1984 for the Apple II/II+ with 64K and the IIe at an MSRP of $295 [$920], later reduced to $179 [$560]. The program shipped on three colour-coded floppies, a grey bootable "systems disk" containing the word processor, database and spreadsheet applications (Janewrite, Janelist and Janecalc, respectively), a yellow "help disk" with the tutorial, and a black "data disk" for the user to save files. To ease the need for disk swapping, it would hunt for the right disk in either disk drive if you had two. Versions for the IBM PC and Atari 8-bits were said to be in progress.
The initial release was uniquely accompanied by its own single-button mouse (Instagram link), a lower-cost unit — Kotick admitted settling for "a lesser quality product" — manufactured under contract by joystick maker Wico and incompatible with Apple's own later mouse options. This mouse interfaced to the Apple with a custom card and an 8-pin connector.
Jane's appearance at the show attracted attention from another Steve, but at the Apple booth instead: Steve Jobs. Jobs visited the company in Ann Arbor and, suitably impressed, told Kotick and Marks they were wasting their time in college. Kotick duly dropped out to concentrate on the company, much to the consternation of his parents.
Because it was intended to run on any existing Apple II with sufficient RAM, pretty much nothing was assumed about the hardware. It displayed strictly in monochrome and used the Apple hi-res mode to display upper and lowercase since the II/II+'s text mode was purely uppercase. Additionally, as 80-column capability wasn't universal, it used a software text shaper to display 60-column text in the word processor and, here, in the file requester. Basic windows like these, with title and information in the actual window bars, served for dialogue boxes and file selection.
Although no emulator presently supports Jane's oddball original mouse, the PBS MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour did a piece on Arktronics in 1984 (the photo above of Marks and an open Apple II case is from this clip) and, along with pictures of the Arktronics offices which I've scattered throughout this article, had some screenshots that illustrate its capabilities. Here a document is being edited in Janewrite. You can see close, scroll and size gadgets in the window frame, but interestingly the control to maximize the current window is in the lower right.
The top of the screen shows the editing tools (hand pointer, arrow, scissors [cut], camera [copy] and paste jar), icons for the three core apps, and then system-wide icons for on-line help, printing, the file manager, preferences and "STOP" to globally cancel an operation. Across the bottom, beside the window maximize gadget, are tools for adjusting line justification, font style (bold, underline, bold and underline, superscript, subscript), print settings and search. I'll have more to say about all of these when we get to Jane's Commodore port.
Document windows could also be moved and resized, and multiple windows from different Jane applications could be open simultaneously.
If you hit Control-Reset, a Easter egg briefly flashes on-screen with the names of the Apple II programmers: Mike Lagae, John R. Haggis, Brent Iverson, Jim Poje, Peter Lee, Uwe Pleban, Allen Leibowitz and Ken Roe. Because portability to other, sometimes wildly different, systems was always contemplated, application-level components were written in a high level language and compiled for the target (allegedly an early microcomputer dialect of C), with the graphics and I/O drivers written directly in assembly. With the release of the IIc Arktronics updated the program to support Apple's mouse as well.
Reviews of the Apple II version were decidedly mixed. In June 1984, InfoWorld called it "innovative" but also observed that "overbearing use of icons, some slow features, and some awkwardness mar the product, which could benefit from an emphasis on efficiency rather than gimmickry." Down under, Your Computer in November 1984 liked the simple interface and believed it would appeal to undemanding users but criticized the 236-page manual and found the mouse unreliable. "When the mouse works properly, it is good," wrote reviewer Evan McHugh, but "when it doesn't it's the pits." Likewise, although A+'s 1985 review also liked the interface and the fact that multiple windows from each module could be open at once, the magazine also felt that "the individual modules in Jane are not up to professional productivity quality." Perhaps because of the software display, Janewrite "was too slow to respond to the keystrokes of a moderately proficient typist," and Janecalc, equally slow, was also panned as "crippled" because it only supported a 24x20 maximum spreadsheet. "Thank you, Jane," quipped reviewer Danny Goodman, "[l]eave your number at the door."
Jane was also billed as available for the Commodore 64, even in contemporary advertising, but COMPUTE!'s Gazette in January 1985 said it was "scheduled to be released for the Commodore 64 by the time you read this. The price is expected to be about $80 [$240]." Interviewed for the article, Marks said that Jane for the 64 was to come as a combination cartridge and disk package, where a "32K plug-in cartridge" would quickly and automatically bring up the system. The article claimed the cartridge would autoboot the applications from (now) just a single floppy plus the data disk, though I suspect the actual configuration was that the cartridge contained the applications and the disk contained the online tutorial, simultaneously furnishing a modicum of both instant access and copy protection. Notably, this version didn't come with its own mouse; Marks said they were working to support third-party mice as well as joystick and "touch pad" (presumably KoalaPad) options instead. Accounting for publishing delays, the Gazette piece would have been written several months prior in the fall of 1984 — after advertisements for the C64 version of Jane had been in multiple periodicals such as Creative Computing and Family Computing claiming you could purchase it already.
In fact, the 64 version of Jane would never be released — it was simply cancelled once Commodore paid Arktronics to port it to the 128 and badged it as a Commodore product. As the 128's graphic and sound capabilities are virtually identical to the 64's in 40-column mode, save for the extra colour RAM, the port was relatively straightforward. (At the same time Commodore also rebadged the CP/M-based Perfect Software series from Thorn EMI for the 128, but this was non-exclusive, and their rebranded versions were exactly the same as sold for other CP/M-compatible systems. Goheen promised "comprehensive and professional developer support" for the new computer.)
The new Jane could also be made cheaper: since the 128 is capable of autobooting a suitably coded floppy disk in drive 8, the cartridge could be dispensed with and the less expensive three-floppy scheme restored (though the grey disk was now called the "application disk"). A 128-mode 1541 fastloader is used if the new and much faster 1570 or 1571 disk drives aren't detected, though the 1571 still boots Jane noticeably faster than the fastloader.
(Parenthetically, a frequent misconception is that the Z80 in the 128 does the boot sector check to start CP/M. In fact, the 8502 does that after the Z80 has already checked the Commodore key isn't down and entered 128 mode. In CP/M's case, the code in the CP/M disk boot sector instructs the 8502 to give control back to the Z80 so it can finish the boot sequence — if this weren't the case, the BASIC BOOT command wouldn't be able to start CP/M. Interestingly, 1581s booting CP/M have a special startup file to keep their own CP/M boot sector in a different location.)
Otherwise, Jane 128 openly betrayed its origins on the 64: other than fastbooting with the 1571, which it mostly got for free, and support for the 128's new keys it took no advantage of any other 128 features, in particular no 2MHz support nor true VDC 80-column mode. Although the manual and box copy say using a mouse is supported, only the original 1350 mouse works, which strictly emulates a joystick. All three applications that were in the Apple II version are included. Under the hood the apps are implemented as overlays for a central kernel called
JANEGM. Sadly, I didn't see any obvious credits while scanning through the disk files.
The manual, which appears to have been written by a third party, insists on camelcasing the apps as JaneWrite, JaneCalc and JaneList even though the rear box copy doesn't distinguish them that way and the Apple II version and Arktronics' own advertising called them Janewrite, Janecalc and Janelist. I'll use the latter here.
Both Jane and the Perfect series were demonstrated with the 128 for Winter CES 1985, though Commodore didn't announce MSRPs then for any of them at the time. It eventually emerged later that year for $49.95 [$150]; by the next year some retailers were selling it for as low as $35 [$100], compared to each of the Perfect titles then going for $45 apiece [$130]. Plus, the Perfect titles, being CP/M-based, were bland and text-based and failed to show off the C128's graphics, so Commodore ended up emphasizing Jane more in its contemporary marketing.
Booting Jane 128 from the 128DCR's internal 1571 drive with my own 1902 monitor.
Although its interface is similar to the Apple II's in broad strokes, Jane 128's most obvious difference is colour. However, there are numerous more subtle UI changes in this version, sufficient for it to be called "Jane 2.0" internally before release. We'll step through them here and in the next set of screenshots because they're an interesting comparison point to modern human interface practice.
As with the Apple II, across the top of the screen are the various icons, or what the manual calls "pictures." These were slightly altered for the 128 from the Apple II originals. The blue icons again set the mode of the pointer ("tools") from the hand pointer, the insertion arrow, scissors (cut), camera (copy) and paste jar. The current tool is highlighted. You select a new tool by clicking on it, but you can also use the function keys (CLR/HOME, F1, F3, F5 and F7).
By modern conventions Jane's tools are used backwards: instead of selecting a text range and "choosing a tool" (e.g., Command-C for copy) to operate on it, you choose a tool first and with that tool select the text range it operates on. I'll demonstrate this specific functionality in a couple instances, but any verb-object operation in Jane will work this way. (Linguistically, this makes Jane a head-initial language, while most modern GUIs are head-final.)
Next to the tools are the main apps, Janewrite (now in purple), Janecalc (in green) and Janelist (in cyan), and next to them in grey are the same standard applets built into the kernel (online help, print dialogue, disk/file manager and setup). Finally, the STOP icon, now a solid red, stops the current app, and can be used to escape some screens, though not all. Unexpectedly it doesn't serve to quit Jane entirely: you just turn the computer off. Jane remembers what app is loaded and doesn't reload the overlay if you exit and re-enter it.
However, unlike Jane for the Apple II, Jane 128 does not allow you to have multiple documents open simultaneously, a limitation that challenges the definition of "integrated software." In fact, of the three official Commodore productivity packages we've looked at so far, only poor abused 3-Plus-1 could do so. If you're working in one app and select another, Jane 128 will prompt you to save your work as if you'd clicked STOP, and the window will close. Given that the Apple II version managed to implement multiple documents in 64K of RAM, the Commodore 64 version — let alone the 128 — would seem to have little excuse, though I can think of two potential explanations. One is to increase the amount of memory available for any one document, which the Apple II version was indeed criticized for. The second is particular to the 128: its default memory configuration doesn't have a lot of free RAM, and it may have been judged too complicated to span or swap working sets across banks. (Some fiddling in the monitor shows that the documents simply occupy RAM in bank 1 and don't span elsewhere.) On the other hand, other 128 applications certainly do manage it, and it's possible development deadlines were a contributing factor.
Let's start out with the online help, one of Marks and Kotick's fundamental design goals. Assuming you got the joystick (or 1350) plugged into the right port, there's a big honking question mark. What happens when you click on it?
You get right into the online help window. The pointer snaps to the options; you can also move the pointer from option or cell to another option or cell with the CRSR keys/128 arrow keys and select it with the Commodore key.
The window's yellow border is salient: any window that gives you choices to select from carries a yellow border. We'll see this again later. Incidentally, the manual is not in colour (just black, white and an accent magenta), and possibly as a result is all but totally ignorant of these UI choices or why they were made.
The Apple II version's windows have a corner close gadget in the typical open square style, but this would only have made visual sense to someone familiar with the Lisa or Mac — which most Commodore users in 1985 wouldn't be. Instead, here windows you can close have a big bright red EXIT button (the ESC key can also serve this role in most cases). All icons are simply drawn onto the VIC-II high-res screen; unlike Magic Desk where pretty much everything was a sprite, the only sprite here is the pointer. Windows cannot be moved or resized, but by limiting icon and window boundaries to VIC-II 8x8 cells, drawing is fairly fast.
Of course, most of the topics are on the yellow help disk (see? it matches). Jane 128, like the Apple II version, supports two disk drives, so you could have the help disk in device 9 and it would find it.
The online help is pretty good, considering. It shows the icons and images as they would appear on-screen, and while they aren't live, they are accurate. The only black eye it gets is the technically truthful but functionally insufficient prompt "Press a key to continue" — the joystick or 1350 mouse button also work, and so does the ESC key to exit early, even though the exit button isn't shown. Some help items are animated and show you a demonstration, and each app has its own bespoke help.
The system keeps track of what disks are where. If we start Janewrite by going to the typewriter, this blue dialogue box will appear — informational dialogue boxes always have a blue border — as it loads the overlay ...
... but then looks for a data disk, fails to find it, and asks for one. You need one even for a new document, and you can get stuck in a loop here if you don't provide one (pressing ESC just makes it try again, and clicking on the STOP icon doesn't do anything). You could put in the black data disk it comes with, but this one contains our generous donor's files, so we'll just give a blank disk image to VICE instead which Jane will offer to format. When creating a new data disk in VICE, if a 1571 is detected then Jane will want a real
.d71with the full available space, not a
.d64, as it will then expect it can format both sides of the virtual disk. However, all of the Jane original disks, including the black one, are formatted single-sided for the 1541 since many early 128 owners would still be using one.
The other way you can do this is from the disk icon. As these icons are in grey, so are their windows (except, curiously, help, but I can see how a yellow question mark would have looked bad against a white background), suggesting a global applet served by the central Jane kernel.
The disk icon brings up a basic file manager allowing you to make duplicate backup files (but only to the same disk), rename or delete them, or create a new disk. The copy option is the default and is pre-selected when the window opens, which is irritating, because our modern reflexive habit of selecting the file first and then the action will cause an immediate copy to occur before you get the chance to click anything else. I don't think this was just me: there were several spurious duplicate files on the original black data disk I suspect for the same reason. If files are present on the disk, they will appear with their names and a filetype letter (W, C or L for Janewrite, Janecalc or Janelist respectively). Notice the slightly misshapen scrolling arrows, which were nice and clean on the Apple.
We'll provide the
.d71to Jane here.
Windows warning you about data loss have a red border. Interestingly, it provides both a No button and the exit button, which both do the same thing: abort back to the file manager. Jane seems unable to distinguish between an unformatted disk and a completely absent one, and will (fruitlessly) attempt to format an empty drive.
Formatting in progress. The time estimates are surprisingly not far off.
With our disk formatted, let's return to Janewrite at the end, since this will be the majority of the documents we'll convert. Instead, we'll start with the spreadsheet, Janecalc.
Whenever any of the three built-in applications starts up, and once Jane has located the data disk, a file selector (in grey) appears. There are no spreadsheets ("worksheets") on our freshly formatted disk, so we click the NEW icon.
Entering the new filename (blue window). You may have noticed that the red and blue windows are all invariably the same size regardless of contents and any active controls they contain. This probably simplified rendering quite a bit.
Because Janecalc is green, its content window border is likewise green, and because Jane 128 doesn't multitask between the applications, it takes up the entirety of the screen.
Two templates are provided, along with a roll-your-own option. We'll go with the Home Budget for illustration.
The Home Budget template pulls up a simplified home budget by month which you can fill in. Jane supports 40, 64 and 80 column modes, all rendered in software on the VIC-IIe 320x200 display (not with the VDC's 640x200 display), but by default it uses 40. (I'll get to this in more detail in the word processor.)
Along the bottom are various operators and the extent of the formula functions available (hardly competition for the Convergent WorkSlate). They can be selected with the pointer in lieu of text entry, which makes them quite discoverable, but in practice it's simply faster to type them. No other functions are implemented. Since the content window cannot be resized, the maximize gadget from the Apple II version became obviously useless and was removed.
By using the joystick/mouse you can use the hand to point to a cell and then, with the hand pointing to it, just start typing text or a number. The cursor keys will move the pointer from cell to cell for you, though they will not exit the content area.
If you click or otherwise select the cell with the hand, however, Jane considers this an attempt to construct a formula, which again would be frustrating to modern audiences used to, say, Microsoft Excel. But to edit it again, you pick the insert tool instead of the hand, and this time you must select the cell to type in it.
Motion around the content area in all three applications is accomplished using multiple small icons in the bottom and right window borders. The "half full" icon pushes it all the way to the outer edge in that direction, while the double and single arrows move the viewport by large leaps and small leaps respectively. There are no thumbs to show relative location, but you can click anywhere along the scroll area for a proportionately "medium" jump if you like. You can also use CTRL-CRSR/CTRL-arrow keys.
Even in 40-column mode, and even given that the scroll doesn't animate and just snaps to the new position, scrolling is agonizingly slow and multiple clicks on the scroll controls invariably overshoot. Putting it in 80 column mode doesn't just give you more on the screen — it also means you don't need to endure as many pauses trying to move around. Again, I'll have more to say about font sizes when we get to Janewrite.
Unique to Janecalc, the scrolling actually wraps. Worksheets remain limited to 26 columns (A-Z), as in the Apple II version, but now up to 50 rows are allowed. Still, this wouldn't have been sufficient for anything larger than a modest small business, even in 1985.
Formulas are approximately VisiCalc-style using A1 absolute notation for cells, though there are no sigils for functions (not that there's very many) and ranges are delimited by colons. Most basic math operators and parentheses are available. Here, we'll get a sum of this row ...
... and then manually calculate an average by dividing the sum by the count of populated rows (we could also just use
avg). The template includes this at the bottom, but this shows you how formula entry worked.
As we add data to dependent cells the sheets recalculate but circular referenc
