What free Windows text editor should I use to look at MIF files?

[Fred Ridder]

Largely correct. Interleaf TPS predated FrameMaker by about 5 years. Until about 1990, both it and FrameMaker only ran on workstations and minicomputers (SUN SPARCstations, DEC PDPs, etc.) so the Interleaf licensing model was actually pretty familiar to (if not popular with) customers. Interleaf was also a structured authoring tool years before structured information (e.g., SGML) became an accepted concept, so I'd have to say that it was the real pioneer. But the combination of unpopular licensing and unfamiliar document model definitely gave FrameMaker a leg up when they got started.

Another competitor started the same year as Frame, namely Ventura Publisher, who had the weight of Xerox behind them (this may or may not have been a good thing). Publisher had the advantage of being able to directly accept content created in a variety of other applications, such as MS Word, Wordstar, and WordPerfect, but had the disadvantage of not being a useable self-contained document authoring environment like FrameMaker.

And there was also LaTeX for the hard core who didn't believe in WYSIWYG (or WYSIAWYG).

When the Windows version of FrameMaker came along in 1991, and FrameBuilder (the SGML version) in 1992, there were a whole new set of competitors, including startup Arbortext in the SGML arena. 

-Fred

> Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2014 19:22:42 +0100
> To: docudoc at hotmail.com; craigede at hotmail.com; shmuelw1 at gmail.com; framers at lists.frameusers.com
> From: srickaby at wordmongers.demon.co.uk
> Subject: RE: What free Windows text editor should I use to look at MIF files?
> 
> At 10:11 -0400 6/10/14, Fred Ridder wrote:
> 
> >Sorry, Craig, but there's nothing to suggest that MIF has any basis in SGML, either.
> 
> Just goes to show how pioneering the original product was. Afair, its only competitor was Interleaf, which required one 'administrator' per six or so seats.
> 
> -- 
> Steve [reliving bitter memories from 1993-4]
 		 	   		  
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