Word processing software is, and has been for decades, among the most common of applications utilized for both commercial and home computing. It is interesting to note, then, that the history and development of word processing has had very little in common with the development of practical computing.

A simple definition of word processing might be the application of technology to manipulate printed text. That said, the lineage of word processing must be traced to the invention of both the printing press and of movable type--both arguably dating from around the end of the Middle Ages. These earliest systems were as costly as they were cumbersome, which caused the printed page to be held in widespread imagination as high art indeed. The result was that hand lettering, with all its inherent risks for errors and illegibility, remained the norm for the vast majority of text, for...