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VisiCalc

There was still a need to find a common use for a personal computer that would increase the demand for it. In 1978, Harvard Business School student, Daniel Bricklin, came up with the idea for an interactive visible calculator. Bricklin and Bob Frankston then co-invented the software program VisiCalc [1]. VisiCalc was a spreadsheet, and the first 'killer' application for personal computers as this application provided a justification for using personal computers as a productive tool.

The fact that VisiCalc was not patented has led to interesting discussion over whether software innovation would have been helped or hindered by a Visicalc patent, with Dan Bricklin taking part in this debate, to express the advantages stemming from the lack of patent.

Links

A Brief History of Spreadsheets - Decision Support System Resources - by D. J. Power, Editor, DSSResources.COM.

Anything Under the Sun - Made by Man - http://www.krajec.com/blog/archives/2005/08/what_if_visical.html - What if VisiCalc was Patented?

Implementing VisiCalc - Bob Frankston - Preface.

Inventors - http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa010199.htm - The First Spreadsheet - VisiCalc - Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston.

VisiCalc - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VisiCalc - Wikipedia.

VisiCalc: Information from its creators, Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston - http://www.bricklin.com/visicalc.htm - Dan Bricklin.

What if VisiCalc had been patented? - http://danbricklin.com/log/2005_06_29.htm#patents - Dan Bricklin.

Developed by Peter Hale, 2006. The University of the West of England, Bristol, UK.