Microsoft Works

Microsoft Works is a discontinued office suite developed by Microsoft. Works was smaller, was less expensive, and had fewer features than Microsoft Office or other major office suites. Its core functionality included a word processor, a spreadsheet and a database management system. Later versions had a calendar application and a dictionary while older releases included a terminal emulator. Works was available as a standalone program, and as part of a namesake home productivity suite. Because of its low cost ($40 retail, as low as $2 OEM), companies frequently pre-installed Works on their low-cost machines.

Microsoft Works originated as MouseWorks, an integrated spreadsheet, word processor and database program, designed for the Macintosh by ex-Apple employee Don Williams and Rupert Lissner. Williams was planning to emulate the success of AppleWorks, a similar product for Apple II computers. However, Bill Gates and his Head of Acquisitions, Alan M. Boyd, convinced Williams to license the product to Microsoft instead. Initially it was to be a scaled-down version of Office for the (then) small laptops such as the Radio Shack TRS-80 Model 100 which Microsoft was developing. As laptops grew in power, however, Microsoft Works, as it was to be called, evolved as a popular product in its own right.

On September 14, 1987, Microsoft unveiled Works for DOS.

Through version 4.5a, Works used a monolithic program architecture whereby the Works Word Processor and Spreadsheet/Database documents ran in windows of the same program interface. This resulted in a small memory and disk footprint, which enabled it to run on slower computers with requirements as low as 6 MB of RAM and 12 MB free disk space. Works 2000 (Version 5.0) switched to a modular architecture which opens each document as a separate instance and uses the print engine from Internet Explorer.