Foom
Latest
Appleworks dies. Long live iWork
ComputerWorld UK reports that AppleWorks has been retired by Apple after 23 years. AppleWorks, aka ClarisWorks né StyleWare provided a complete, low-cost office suite for Macintosh computers all the way into the PowerPC era. I wrote my dissertation in the program and until a couple of years ago I still used it to create our family holiday cards. I was surprised by the news as I had assumed the program had been put to rest years ago, buried along-side Hypercard. Instead, it took the release of Apple Numbers to finally kill the old workhorse. iWork '08 imports AppleWorks documents including spreadsheets, presentations and word processing files.
Foom Software
Chris Forsythe and Evan Schoenberg (Adium Lead and Project Managers) just announced a joint venture in the form of new Mac shareware company Foom Software. I understand their excitement in wanting to announce the new project, but it feels a bit premature to go public at this point considering that Foom currently has no software announced or available for download, and won't for at least another month, according to Chris's blog. Foom will be working with the only person Google does not know about Chris Emery, and Vina Venkatesh of MP3 Alarm Clock fame on their secret new mystery product. It may not be big news now, but it's something to stick in your newsreader and keep an eye on.
