The Icon Bar: General: Arcol Desktop and Advance
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Arcol Desktop and Advance |
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ej2095 (19:59 15/9/2013) arawnsley (20:12 15/9/2013) hubersn (14:05 17/9/2013) arawnsley (18:17 17/9/2013) ej2095 (18:50 21/9/2013) CJE (10:41 16/9/2013) arawnsley (15:12 16/9/2013)
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ste j |
Message #122667, posted by ej2095 at 19:59, 15/9/2013 |
Member
Posts: 2
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Hi all
Just wondering does anybody remember these?
Used them at school about 20 years ago but i can not find them anywhere now
Arcol was a graphic package and Advance was wordprocessing package |
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Andrew Rawnsley |
Message #122668, posted by arawnsley at 20:12, 15/9/2013, in reply to message #122667 |
R-Comp chap
Posts: 600
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Advance is a fairly common Acorn program that had WP, spreadsheet and database. CJE or other dealers / ebay should sort you out. It was a bit, erm, poor though.
Essentially Advance was a seriously cut-down version of Impression for word-processing (I think), Schema for spreadsheeting, and DataPower for databasing. It's a while since I looked at it, so I could be wrong, but I don't think so.
Curiously, for the later "NC works", they switched to Easiwriter for WP duties, and I want to say Eureka for spreadsheet, but I may be getting confused there. Datapower remained the database of choice, I suspect because its author Neil Rainne was instrumental in the creation of RISC OS itself.
Arcol, now, there's a blast from the past. I think I may even have a copy I was sent for review. The main graphics app of that period was the Artisan/ProArtisan range, or Atelier from Minerva. I think Arcol was the cut-price alternative, but I genuinely cannot recall more. I think I'd need to dig through the boxes in the office. I'm not sure if I saw a desktop version or not. Wow, that goes back a long way! |
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Chris Evans |
Message #122670, posted by CJE at 10:41, 16/9/2013, in reply to message #122667 |
CJE Micros chap
Posts: 228
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Hi all
Just wondering does anybody remember these?
Used them at school about 20 years ago but i can not find them anywhere now
Arcol was a graphic package and Advance was wordprocessing package We have new copies of Acorn Advance in stock! http://www.cjemicros.co.uk/micros/individual/newprodpages/prodinfo.php?prodcode=ACO-ADV
I can do 50% off the current price on the website! |
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Andrew Rawnsley |
Message #122671, posted by arawnsley at 15:12, 16/9/2013, in reply to message #122670 |
R-Comp chap
Posts: 600
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Worth mentioning that Advance isn't 32bit safe, so not really suitable for use on anything later than a RiscPC. IIRC it was a bit iffy on StrongArm, too, but I think most of those problems were resolved with patches (key disc protection also removed?).
Essentially Advance was a product of a time (late 80s, early 90s) and very much of a price, much like MS Works vs MS Office. Today, I suspect you'll find its "almost non-existant" user interface quite tough to work with.
That said, 50% off is a good price if you're a collector Otherwise, I'd check out our Fireworkz Pro as a cross-platform integrated package that is compatible with recent hardware as well (eg. Pi, RISC OS 5, ARMini/X and so on).
[Edited by arawnsley at 16:12, 16/9/2013] |
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Steffen Huber |
Message #122672, posted by hubersn at 14:05, 17/9/2013, in reply to message #122668 |
Member
Posts: 91
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Curiously, for the later "NC works", they switched to Easiwriter for WP duties, and I want to say Eureka for spreadsheet, but I may be getting confused there. Datapower remained the database of choice, I suspect because its author Neil Rainne was instrumental in the creation of RISC OS itself. IIRC, after "Learning Curve" featuring Acorn Advance, Acorn bundled a "Home Office" package consisting mainly of EasiWriter, Pipedream 4 and DataPower. This was still A5000 time IIRC.
Advance was Impression Style, DataPower and Schema 2 IIRC. And some graphing app I don't remember. Or was it Impression Junior, DataPower and Schema? |
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Andrew Rawnsley |
Message #122674, posted by arawnsley at 18:17, 17/9/2013, in reply to message #122672 |
R-Comp chap
Posts: 600
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IIRC Advance was cut down below any commercially available version of each app. So, the wordprocessor was less than Imp Junior (but probably ballpark-similar), the database was much less capable than DataPower (maybe more akin to Junior Database, or less), and similarly with Schema.
Whilst it is surprising to see that people *are* still using it to create documents, I don't think you'd choose to today, whereas the "full" versions of said applications are still quite viable. |
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ste j |
Message #122675, posted by ej2095 at 18:50, 21/9/2013, in reply to message #122674 |
Member
Posts: 2
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Cheers guys
I knew my memory wasnt that bad
Thank you once again for the update |
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The Icon Bar: General: Arcol Desktop and Advance |