Acornsoft Explained

Type:Privately held company
Location:Cambridge, England
Industry:Software industry
Owner:Acorn Computers
Parent:Acorn Network Computer
Website:www.acornsoft.com

Acornsoft was the software arm of Acorn Computers, and a major publisher of software for the BBC Micro and Acorn Electron. As well as games, it also produced a large number of educational titles, extra computer languages and business and utility packages – these included word processor VIEW and the spreadsheet ViewSheet supplied on ROM and cartridge for the BBC Micro/Acorn Electron and included as standard in the BBC Master and Acorn Business Computer.

History

Acornsoft was formed in late 1980 by Acorn Computers directors Hermann Hauser and Chris Curry, and David Johnson-Davies, author of the first game for a UK personal computer[1] and of the official Acorn Atom manual "Atomic Theory and Practice". David Johnson-Davies was managing director and in early 1981 was joined by Tim Dobson, Programmer and Chris Jordan, Publications Editor.

While some of their games were clones or remakes of popular arcade games (e.g. Hopper is a clone of Sega's Frogger, Snapper is Namco's Pac-Man, Arcadians is Namco's Galaxian), they also published a number of original titles such as Aviator, Elite, and Revs. Acornsoft also published text adventures by authors such as Peter Killworth, including Philosopher's Quest (previously titled Brand X) and Countdown to Doom.

As a result of the publication of a method to circumvent copy protection measures employed by Acornsoft titles,[2] a High Court injunction against Computing Publications - publisher of Personal Computer World - was granted to Acorn Computers "requiring all copies of the January 1984 issue of PCW to be withdrawn from sale", with the article concerned being regarded as inciting readers to "duplicate computer programs". This injunction was subsequently lifted as a consequence of an out-of-court settlement between the parties involving a damages payment of £65,000 plus costs to Acorn "to meet Acorn's expenses in developing a new locking device".[3] The article's author, Guy Kewney, and the magazine's editor, Jane Bird, argued that printing a software routine showing how to save Acornsoft cassette software to disk was a service to the magazine's readers. The cost of printing the magazine issue concerned was estimated at £100,000.[4]

Acornsoft became a subsidiary within Acorn Computer Group, distinct from Acorn Computers who were responsible for the development of Acorn's microcomputer systems,[5] but Acornsoft ceased to operate as a separate company upon the departure of David Johnson-Davies in January 1986.[6] Past this date, Acorn Computers used the Acornsoft name on office software it released in the VIEW family for the BBC Master series. In 1986 Superior Software was granted a licence to publish some Acornsoft games[7] and re-released many, individually and as compilations such as the Play It Again Sam and Acornsoft Hits series. By agreement, the Acornsoft name was also used on the packaging of some of the subsequent Superior games. Superior chose not to take on Acornsoft's text adventure games, most of which were released in updated versions by Topologika along with some sequels from the same authors.

In 1997, Acorn sought to revive the Acornsoft brand for new software releases, such as upgrades to RISC OS, programming tools, a new Web browser, multitasking movie playback (using Acorn Replay), and Java for RISC OS. A stated objective was to demonstrate that a "wide range of innovative software at competitive prices" was available for RISC OS, with support also being potentially offered to third-party software producers. Acornsoft products themselves would be supported by marketing, including advertising, and the provision of press review samples.[8] [9]

Branding

Acornsoft titles extended their consistent branding to the software's loading screens.

Select titles

Acornsoft Games range

Including all arcade, text adventure and board games. All games were compatible with the BBC Micro Model B. Games followed by Model A & B were compatible with both machines. Games followed by Electron were also released separately for the Acorn Electron. Games are listed by their catalogue numbers which are roughly the order of release of the BBC versions.

There are also a number of completed but unreleased games that have found their way into the public domain such as Crazy Balloon, Hellforce and Bandit that date from around 1983.

Acornsoft Education range

Acornsoft produced a wide range of educational titles aimed at many different age groups.

Acornsoft also published and distributed a range of educational software developed by ASK (Applied Systems Knowledge) that were widely used in schools running BBC Micros. These included Podd (find out which actions a red blobby character can perform (e.g. jump, smile, dance), Squeeze (a two player strategy game of squeezing shapes onto a board) and Cranky (solve maths problems to repair a living calculator). These titles were part of the Acornsoft catalogue but used a different code (XBE?? – all other Acornsoft titles began with S so the Education range on BBC Micro cassettes would be SBE??). They ran on both the BBC Micro Model B and Acorn Electron.

The Ivan Berg Software range was also mainly educational but had its own distinct code (XBX??). This included the 6 Grandmaster Quizzes (Theatre, Crime & Detection, Music, History, Science Fiction and Royal), relationship aids "..I Do" Your Guide to a Happy Marriage and The Dating Game and GCE/CSE revision guides (Mathematics, Biology and English).

Acornsoft also distributed other ranges of educational programs developed by companies such as ICL, Good Housekeeping and Bourne but they are not considered part of the official catalogue.

Acornsoft Business range

Acornsoft produced a range of office software for home and business use.

The series continues but mainly with add-on products for the VIEW word processor such as ViewIndex (an automatic index generator) and ViewSpell (spell-checker) as well as newer versions.

View Professional (1987) was a combined wordprocessor, spreadsheet and database[14] similar to PipeDream on the Z88.[15]

Although primarily a programming language suite, Acornsoft released its P-System product featuring UCSD Pascal and Fortran 77 compilers as part of its business range.[16] Developed by TDI for Acornsoft, the product required a 6502 second processor and disc system, preferably with two drives. Despite the £299 price, various tools including an assembler and linker were omitted from the product, these being made available in a separate Advanced Development Toolkit from TDI.[17]

Acornsoft Languages range

Acorn systems came with a version of the BBC BASIC programming language as standard but Acornsoft also produced a wide range of other languages that could be loaded in by cassette or disc or in some cases, supplied in ROM form.

The relative performance of some of Acornsoft's languages was evaluated using a benchmark based on the Takeuchi function, Tak by former Acornsoft managing director, David Johnson-Davies, noting that "it is difficult to imagine a language that performs badly on Tak being much use for anything", illustrating a diversity amongst these language implementations in terms of readability, speed and generated code size.[22] A follow-up article expanded the comparison to other language implementations such as Oxford Pascal, Z80 versions of BBC BASIC, Turbo Pascal and Small-C.[23]

Acornsoft Graphics range and more

The graphics range was used to demonstrate the graphical power of the Acorn computers but only three titles were made available. The X?? code was then used for other types of software.

The range took on various themes including Creative Sound (X26).

External links

Notes and References

  1. Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: Web site: Sinclair Science of Cambridge MK14 Moon Lander . YouTube.
  2. News: Secret knowledge . Personal Computer World . January 1984 . 23 April 2021 . Kewney . Guy . 124 .
  3. News: Acorn acts . Personal Computer World . February 1984 . 23 April 2021 . Kewney . Guy . 13 .
  4. News: Magazine in £65,000 legal deal . Home Computing Weekly . 10 January 1984 . 24 October 2021 . 5 .
  5. Book: This is Acorn Computer . Acorn Computers Limited . 27 March 2021 . 36 .
  6. News: Acornsoft - back in the fold . Acorn User . April 1986 . 27 October 2020 . 15 .
  7. News: Acorn-Superior software deal . Electron User . 3 . 12 . September 1986 . 17 January 2021 . 6 .
  8. News: Going Soft . Clan News Letter . 1997 . 6 April 2021 . 9 .
  9. News: Acorn heralds the return of AcornSoft . Acorn User . September 1997 . 6 April 2021 . 4 .
  10. Web site: Free Fall. 9 May 2015. Ian Bell.
  11. Web site: Micropower games on disk . stardot.org.uk . 2022-08-22.
  12. Web site: Acornsoft Game Authors . stardot.org.uk . 2022-08-22.
  13. Save up to £160 on these AU offers! . Acorn User . April 1985 . 23 September 2022 .
  14. View Professional review. 6. 4. Beebug. 1987. 16.
  15. Cambridge Z88 review: A Beeb By Any Other Name?. 6. 7. Beebug. December 1987. 8.
  16. Book: P-System . Acornsoft Limited . 23 September 2022 .
  17. Acornsoft's UCSD Pascal System . Beebug . Maher . John . January–February 1985 . 23 September 2022 . 7–10 . 3 . 8 .
  18. Book: Richards. John. Jobson. Chris. BCPL for the BBC Microcomputer: User Guide. 1983. 9780907876106.
  19. Book: Acornsoft. Forth for the BBC Microcomputer – Fitting the Forth ROM (SBL13/B). 1984. Acornsoft.
  20. Book: Thornton. Roy. Christensen. Paul. COMAL on the BBC Microcomputer and Acorn Electron SBD19. 1984. Acornsoft. 978-0907876908.
  21. Book: A Choice of Programming Languages for the British Broadcasting Corporation Microcomputer System . Acorn Computers Limited . 29 September 2015.
  22. News: Six of the Best Against the Clock . Acorn User . June 1986 . 28 October 2020 . Johnson-Davies . David . 179, 181–182 .
  23. News: Testing the Tak . Acorn User . November 1986 . 28 October 2020 . Johnson-Davies . David . 197, 199 .

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