Of the shareware* you have on your computer, which are the oldest that you still use? When did you originally obtain it?
You are allowed to count software that has been updated and upgraded over the years by the author, but even more “authentic” would be software in which the actual modification date of the file makes it positively elderly.
Freeware counts too, if it is community-hacker-authored freeware rather than, say, a free patch from Novell or a free driver from Microsoft.
My nominations would be Carpetbag (the 1.4 version I still run under 8.6 was written in 1993, but I obtained the 1.0 version back around 1991) and Flash-It (3.0.2 version = 1993, I had an earlier version as far back as 1991); and DepthMaster, still at version 1.0, which I’ve had and used since 1992.
An astronomy program called Skyglobe that I first installed in late 1992, IIRC. I have had to reinstall it twice since then. I still use it several times a month.
This might not quite count, since I haven’t actually used this utility in a few years, but up until at least 1996 I was very fond of a DOS-based file manipulation utility called PFM (Personal File Manager). It let me do things like flag a bunch of arbitrary files and run a command on each of them. It was tiny, and easily fit on the multi-purpose boot floppies I used to carry around when doing tech support. I’m pretty sure one version of PFM was dated 1984, although I think I had a newer one from 1988 or so at one point.
I just did a Google search for various permutations of PFM, file, manager, DOS, etc. out of curiousity. The only hits I turn up that actually point to this utility are pointers to ancient archives of sites like garbo.uwasa.fi and wuarchive.wustl.edu. Ahh, the good ol’ days…
The niftiest part is the PSP Browser which shows you thumbnails of all the images in a designated folder. Very very nessasary if your a commercial artist or an animator.
Fast Movie Processor V 1.44, 1997
This program will turn a Quicktime or AVI movie into a sequence of still frames. Another animator must-have.
I have a DOS game called Sherlock. It isn’t on this computer, but I still play it at home. I remember playing it as far back as 1994, but it could be older than that, as a friend of mine gave it to me.
HAH! I spit on your crap from the '90s! Catspaw SNOBOL4 from 1985 still gets used when I need to strip all the post-128 characters from a file.
I still use Wordstar 3 for the IBM PC-Jr from 1983, but that’s not shareware. And the Norton Editor from '89 when I have to manipulate characters other editors think are commands.
Oh dear, how to show your PC dotage in one easy step
What’s with these punks who’s oldest software packages are post Win95. Damm, I’m still using applications that were originally compiled under DOS 3.
As for shareware, from the woolly archives:
Aseasy-as, a clone of the DOS Lotus 1-2-3. V3.01H released 1985, my version was 1989.
For a base level spreadsheet and very good graphics (and this was in the VGA days remember!) It still graphs some functions better than the latest releases of 1-2-3 and Excel.
Also a DOS shell called Pathminder v2.01 from 1985 which still get used on some low level file work.
I still have the PC version of “The Collosal Cave Adventure”. This goes back to about 1987 I think. I also still play Infocom’s classic, “Leather Goddesses of Phobos” which is 1989 IIRC. And… once in a great while, I’ll pull out my old copy of Sopwith II (I can’t even remember the year on that one.).
I’ve got two old DOS games: DRUGLORD and the over ancient ZORK on my machine. I usually play Druglord regularly, but downloaded ZORK once, and never really got into it. . .
Tripler
But I have Thursday off. I’ll try it then.
Even better (well I use PSP also, have had versions 3 - 7) for viewing files is ThumbsPlus which shows ALL your files that way. http://fathom.org/opalcat/thumbsplus.html
Damm, I’m still using applications that were originally compiled under DOS 3.