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Comment by cout | Hacker News Reader

This is the main reason I keep my PS/2 around with WordPerfect 5.1. Sure I can go browse the web with Minuet, or I used to before https everywhere, but that means saving and exiting WP. And 30+ years later I'm still waiting for a word processor with a decent Reveal Codes.

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> And 30+ years later I'm still waiting for a word processor with a decent Reveal Codes.

Have you tried... WordPerfect? It still exists: https://www.wordperfect.com/en/product/wordperfect/

The first feature they list is Reveal Codes.

Personally I like Latex as it reveals all the codes and lets you type them, change them, find-and-replace them, define new ones, etc. But then, I'm a mathematician, so it's designed for my stuff.

There are 3 freeware versions of WordPerfect.

• The final version for classic MacOS, and there's a ready-made VM to run it on a modern Mac.

• The GUI version for Linux, and there's a site dedicated to helping you install it on a modern Linux.

• And Tavis Ormandy found and resurrected the final ever terminal-mode text-only WordPerfect for Linux, relinking it for x86 Linux.

I described how to get all 3 here:

https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/20/wordperfect_for_unix_...

AFAIK, the current version of Nota Bene -- a direct descendent of XyWrite -- still has this; the current feature list explicitly mentions "Editable Show Codes view so you can see exactly where commands take effect, and edit them as desired". Nota Bene has survived into the present day by moving pretty firmly into a niche academia market, though, and carries a pretty stiff price ($349).

I knew about IBM PS/2, but I temporarily forgot for a moment and was feeling confused about using WordPerfect 5.1 with PlayStation 2 haha.

Meanwhile my mind first jumped to the old, pre-USB connector used for things like keyboards and mice, and was wondering what wizardry they had built to turn a PS2 keyboard into a complete text processor!

I always thought they were related because my PS/2's did use PS2 connectors.

Yes, the PS/2 connector came from the PS/2 computer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS/2_port

I'm also in the quaint demographic that believes WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS was the apex of distraction-free writing. Switching disks to change the application was just the right amount of intentional friction to stay in the zone.

I keep a Mac IIci that I purchased at a thrift store for $12 to remind me that we haven't progressed that far. It's not fast, but it runs Photoshop, Illustrator, and Vim. Not bad for a 35+ year old machine that will do 80% of what you need. No GPU, but I think that's losing the plot when people can't afford to pay their electricity bills while billion dollar companies continue to scale out the data centers that jack up prices for AI slop nobody wants.

It’s been 30ish years, so I can’t be 100% sure, but Ami Pro 3.1 for Windows had an easy-to-use equation editor that gave great results. And I think its Reveal Codes equivalent was pretty good.

Crashed a lot, though.

I still occasionaly yearn for features not seen since Ami Pro

> decent Reveal Codes.

You and me both, friend.

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