RE: smart words

["Frank Kenneth B." KBF@xxxxxxxx]

Well, I ought to jump in here. What Karin said is correct to the exent
that we have decided not to promote SW as a general purpose word
processor or try to market it as a competitive product to Word et al.
Notwithstanding that, however, and notwithstanding the myriad of
features in the produt that are unrelated to pure editing, it is a much
improved XyWrite/Windows editor, although, because of the purposes for
which we use it in our other products, we have focused on its basic text
editing functionality and interface, and have not spent much time on
fixing/improving some of the more specialized functions we know need
work for a general product such as footnotes, column tables etc.

Because the economics simply aren't there to go the whole product route
for a standalone offering, that leaves us with several alternatives that
still may be of interest to the group.

One of those alternatives is for Nota Bene to produce and market a
"complete" product, using SmartWords as the basis in the same way they
used earlier versions of XyWrite in the past. Most of the work has
already been done by us, so if this occurred, it would happen relatively
quickly. Those discussions are underway and may well materialize.

Another alternative, and one we are seriously considering, is to offer
SW as an editor as a "quasi-beta" product for a modest charge to those
XyWrite users who would desire it. We have an updated filter package we
could offer at additional cost as well (we have to pay royalties to a
third party), and those curent users who wish to work with the product
in its evolving state as we develop and enhance it from time to time
would be getting use of an updated editor at a small cost. We would
really be doing this for 2 reasons: to get feedback from additional
generalized use of the product, which benefits us, and to provide our
current technology to those dedicated users who would want it, which
benefits some of you.

It is clear to us that we cannot make economic sense out of making a
general offering, with all the attendant marketing, support,
documentation and other costs. This is not a decision we are glad to
have made, nor was it made lightly, but it really represents the cold
realities of today's software business. Nevertheless, I would be
interested to see if conceptually this is of any interest to any of you.

K.
> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Phillip P. Ferreira [SMTP:ferreira@xxxxxxxx]
> Sent:	Wednesday, October 22, 1997 10:39 AM
> To:	xywrite@xxxxxxxx
> Subject:	smart words
>
> So what about Smart Words?
>
> Don't hold your breath. I recently had a conversation with Karin
> Walker
> of TTG who told me that there are "no plans" to **ever** release
> 'smart
> words' as a stand alone product. I was told that it will **only** be
> used
> in various "expert systems"
> packages such as 'Wealth Transfer Planning' (or whatever it's called).
>
>
> Phil Ferreira
> Dept. of Philosophy
> Kutztown University of PA
> ferreira@xxxxxxxx
>
>