• Dr. Evil Laboratories

  • by kentsu

This blog recounts the history of Dr. Evil Laboratories, the creator, manufacturer, and retail sales of peripherals and software for the Commodore 64, including the Imagery! adventure game system, the SID Symphony Stereo cartridge, and the Swiftlink-232 cartridge.

Jun
15

A Glimpse into Digital Solution, Inc.'s Products

One can learn quite a bit about a defunct software company's products and timeline from searching through online archives. Digital Solutions created the well-known Paperback / Pocket series for the C-64/128, as well as Amiga versions of at least some of those products.

UPDATE 2020-06-15: Added advertisement from 1986 World of Commodore show.

UPDATE 2020-06-16: Added several more reviews, including product round-ups / comparisons.

UPDATE 2024-06-23: Added new earliest-known ad (Info magazine, June, 1985) plus a reader letter from the April, 1986 TPUG Magazine and a review in the June, 1986 TPUG Magazine.

This document brings together scans of advertisements and reviews of Digital Solution’s Paperback / Pocket for the Commodore 64/128, and the LPD Series for the Commodore Amiga, both of which included which included a word processor (Writer), spreadsheet (Planner), and database (Filer). Also included are selected short articles that provide context about changes in DSI’s products and business.

The material included here was originally published in:

  • Ahoy!
  • Amazing Computing
  • Amiga World
  • Commodore Computing International
  • Commodore Magazine
  • Compute!’s Gazette (eventually an insert within Compute!)
  • Info
  • RUN
  • The Transactor
  • TPUG Magazine
  • Twin Cities 128


All scans were obtained from the Internet Archive except for Twin Cities 128, which was obtained from DLH’s Commodore Archive.

A more-complete history of DSI and its products could include images and discussion about the evolution of the products’ feature sets and documentation, along with information about the people who created these wonderful products, and perhaps even stories from people who fondly remember using the software to get important work accomplished. These software products were also noted for their sophisticated copy protection schemes and I‘m sure a lengthy discourse could be written about that, too.

I will leave all of these worthy tasks to another, more intrepid, historian.

Enjoy!

 

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Posted By: kentsu in Blog Dr. Evil Laboratories , Category: Miscellaneous
Published: Monday, June 15, 2020
Views: 2153
Tags: Digital Solutions, DSI, Filer, LPD, Paperback, Planner, Pocket, Writer
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MauryMarkowitz 4/19/2022

I thought it would be worthwhile to post an update on this story.

Recently someone asked why the product line changed its name from "Paperback xxx" to "Pocket xxx". The original developer works near me so I tracked him down and he mentioned another company had rights to "Paperback Writer".

A few minutes in Google revealed the "other company" was none other than "Paperback Software" started by none other than Adam Osborne to publish software for the PC in 1983. They had a number of products including Paperback Writer. I assume it was some time before they became aware of the DSI version and the rest is history.

Unlike DSI's Paperback, however, Osborne's version was universally panned. Look up some of the reviews sometime, they are *bad*.