GEOS: Graphical Environment Operating System

GEOS, the Graphical Environment Operating System, was a GUI environment, for the Commodore 64. For it's time, it was quite revolutionary, but given the limited processing power and disk storage space of the Commodore 64, it could be quite frustrating or limiting.

Although GEOS would work on a regular Commodore 64 with a single 1541 disk drive (5.25", 160KB per disk), you couldn't fit a whole lot in that configuration. Because of this, GEOS had support for multiple disk drives, as well as REUs (RAM Expansion Units, commonly available in 128KB, 256KB and 512KB models). However, for those who couldn't afford the extra hardware, GEOS also supported something called, "Work Disks". A work disk usually contained only one application (for example, geoWrite), whatever desk accessories you were using (like Text Manager, a primitive clipboard), and the documents that you were using. You might then have another work disk for graphics work.

GEOS supported a variety of input devices, including a joystick, Commodore 1351 (and clones) mouse, and the Koala Pad (a drawing tablet with two buttons). Drivers for several printers were included, and if your driver wasn't included, there was third party software that would let you create your own drivers. Mind you, most drivers used with the Commodore 64/128 were Epson compatible in one form or another, so as a worst case, you could use an Epson driver and get something out of your printer.

GEOS 2.0 (the last "official" release by geoWorks/Berkeley Softworks), was actually a full-featured office suite (by the standards of the Commodore 64). From memory, included in the package were:

• geoWrite - WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) word processor
• geoPaint - Drawing program
• geoSpell - Spell checker
• geoLaser - Used for printing geoWrite documents to an Apple LaserWriter
• geoMerge - Mail-merge program
• Text Grabber - Import from other C64 word processors (keeping formats intact when possible)
• Text Manager - Desk Accessory for collecting "text scraps", and placing them in "albums"
• Photo Manager - Desk Accessory for collecting "photo scraps", and placing them in "albums"
• Calculator - A regular calculator
• Note Pad - The equivalent of a note pad with pages
• And more...

There were several third-party add-ons for GEOS, a lot of them distributed by CMD (Creative Micro Designs). Since I used my Commodore 64 during high school and my first couple of years in university for doing reports, Perfect Print LQ and the geoPrint cable were the ones that I liked the most. Using them, I could get crisp output at 240dpi, which rivaled some low-end laser printers - but, I'm sure that the people in my dorm wanted to shoot me when I printed things out on that old dot-matrix printer.

After GEOS on the Commodore 64/128 and the Apple II, geoWorks then targeted the PC platform. The PC version, called geoWorks Ensemble had most of the same features as the Commodore 64 version, but due to the better hardware on the PC, it was much better. Unfortunately, it couldn't compete with Windows 3.x, and it slowly vanished.

GEOS (for both the 64 and 128) can be downloaded from Click Here Software. (Direct link to download page)

The Obligatory Screenshots

Word Counter Desk Accessory

The only GEOS program that I was able to complete and get working satisfactorily is a Desk Accessory that I wrote to count words in a geoWrite 2.1 document. I was inspired by a similar application, and geoSpell's functionality, but I didn't want to have to leave geoWrite to get the count. I wrote this program using geoProgrammer, and if I still had the source code, I'd gladly give it out - unfortunately, I don't.

To use the program, you'll need to run the file, which will create two files. Use Convert 2.5 to convert them both to GEOS files - one is the desk accessory, the other is some documentation.

The word counter DA was tested with geoWrite 2.1, but I have not tested it with previous versions. How well it will work depends on how backward-compatible geoWrite makes the documents.

You can download the word counter desk accessory here.