Microsoft retires WordPad after 28 years — app no longer available as of Windows 11 24H2
Windows will no longer have an integrated basic rich-text-based word app.
Windows will no longer have an integrated basic rich-text-based word app.
Wordpad always seemed like an annoying and unnecessary half-step between notepad and word to me.
its pretty neat if you dont have access to word, which is likely why they want to get rid of it
Can't say I ever needed it in the 28 years I've been using Windows. I'm sure there are plenty who did, though.
I used it all the time to save text temporarily in. Note worked too, but i like the line break that WordPad had. It made reading and formatting easier.
As others have said, fast opening quick notes with basic formatting.
For example, if I get an unexpected call I need to write down more than a call back number, Wordpad was my go to.
Well, at least when back when I used Windows regularly.
Microsoft's business model has often gotten in the way of anything they do making sense.
Is there anything left to microsoft that makes sense at this point? Maybe the physical doors to the microsoft offices still function.. after you watch an ad?
Rtf is far more lightweight than docx. It's closer to markdown.
It was created for people to open Word docs at home before everyone had Office.
Best Windows built-in way to open files with Unix end lines.
In other words: bloat
Microsoft: We can't spy on your usage when you use wordpad, use O365 instead! (guessing since MS recommends using O365 Word in its place).
TBH, I haven't used wordpad since Windows 98. Not saying others don't use it, but Notepad++ and a myriad of other options are better anyway.
TBH, I haven't used wordpad since Windows 98
which is why they're getting rid of it
it would probably be pretty easy to just patch telemetry into it, except nobody uses it because why would you
What, they couldn't add AI to it?
You wouldn’t add AI to a hand bag?! You wouldn’t add AI to a car?! You wouldn’t add AI to a baby?! You wouldn’t shoot a police man?! … and then steal his helmet?! … and then add AI to it?!
I do not like to add AI.
I would not like it here or there.
I would not like it anywhere.
I would not add it in a handbag.
I would not, could not, in a car.
Not to a baby, not to a helmet.
Not in my house, Not on a mouse.
I do not like to add AI.
I do not now, nor ever will I.
Do you hear me Microsoft?
Take your AI and fuck off.
I'd give it to his grieving widow, then add ai to her.
Oh get fucked Microsoft. Now I have to use notepad when I put the tape measure on the spacebar so teams doesn’t change my status to idle.
Could they please retire modern Windows UI design?
Those contrasting color squares are not the zen those designers think. UI layout being different in paradigm for every application is not the productivity improvement they think. Using titlebars for something other than titles and control buttons is not optimization. Those buttons being some scratches on the screen barely visible is crap from any PoV I can imagine.
And somebody should explain to them that a good design for a billboard, a good design for a glossy magazine, a good design for a shop front, a good design for an office, a good design for a videogame, a good design for a movie and a good design for a workstation are all mutually incompatible in vast majority of cases.
And again about zen, simplicity, air and all that. I understand they think they are very smart and understanding of aesthetics. But zen would be having clean window borders and clearly visible control elements, for starters. And buttons not being just color squares. And in general solutions being subordinate to functional goals of the UI being usable. Industrial ergonomics are zen.
EDIT: I know it's offtopic, not interested - keep walking
"We need to recapture the Apple market share!"
"Got it boss, we'll make it stupid."
It just pains me to see, remember Chinese websites and software around 2007-2008?
Everybody (aware) looked at that with terror.
Now it's the same everywhere.
"Get rid of those ugly strain reliefs on the plugs!"
"Uh, we don't make hardware."
"I don't care, get rid of them!"
I remember a while back Microsoft did an market research thing and found that of their brands, "Xbox" had positive consumer feedback while many of their other product names weren't nearly as favorable.
So what did they do? Did they try to understand what Xbox did differently to leverage that strategy elsewhere? Did they promote the Xbox marketing team to give them a wider purview?
No. They just renamed Zune Music to Xbox Music and Games for Windows to Xbox for Windows. THAT'LL FIX IT!
And then they tank the name X-Box
Wordpad, as I recall, only existed because back in the Windows 95 days nobody had Office and couldn’t open Word documents.
WordPad in Windows 95 was a demonstration of how to use the rich-text editing component built into Windows. Its C++ source code came bundled with MFC (Microsoft Foundation Classes - programming library for making Windows apps using C++) as a sample.
The fact that it was a useful tool for end users was essentially just a side effect.
They should preinstall libre office as a replacement.
people still don't, right? I cant imagine it's very common outside of company computers
Anyone who works for or studies at any organization has it.
They should open-source it, as they did with Calculator.
Libre office writer is a thing
Another thing. But there's a lot of markdown and other lightweight markup editors.
Yeah, sure, a really nice thing.
As is Abiword, which is a bit more of a direct comparison.
As long as you have notepad, you're good.
Notepad++
I would have suggested Sublime. But you still can't print with it properly (only with an extension which prints in background with another program). Sure normally you don't need to print code and with missing markup possibilities it's pointless anyway. But sometimes a raw easy list of ideas needs to be printed.
Now I selfhost a markdown editor just for that usecase.
What if I want rich text?
Have your butler do it for you
Markdown?
You should probably reconsider.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightweight_markup_language
https://www.markdownguide.org/
https://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/master/usage/restructuredtext/basics.html
Any good missing?
Well and then there are interactive or side-by-side editors for most of them.
LaTeX is always free and works on many systems.
here's a little known fact about WordPad: It was Microsoft's first word processing program. Originally introduced as an add-on to MS-DOS in 1981, WordPad later became a part of Windows in the 1990s after the release of Windows 95. It was designed to be simpler and more user-friendly than its more advanced counterpart, Microsoft Word.
I've used windows since the 90s. Not once have I intentionally used WordPad.
It did open by default for some file types for a long time (.doc), usually mangling the content cause it couldn't actually handle them properly. I think it was also the default for .txt files at some point, causing many curse words when editing plain text files, that invisibly weren't so plain any more after... Programs expecting a configuration fine really don't like that sort of thing.
So: I'm very ok with this. Just install LibreOffice or something if you needa Word-like experience. Install notepad++ for anything "plain".
And so the bloodline of windows write is extinguished
This is kinda sad that if you want to do even basic word processing with Microsoft software, your only option now is an ongoing subscription to do so.
...your only option now is an ongoing subscription to do so.
You can also still buy the Office package without subscription. The latest release is from 2024 and 2021 before that. But of course its expensive for basic stuff.
Word pad the goat of somehow interpreting files as not UTF8
And they're making notepad pretty unusable also
I've had no real issuses with the new notepad.
I just hope that they don't continue adding too much stuff to it and it becomes the new wordpad and we don't have a basic box to put text anymore.
One of my biggest problems with the new notepad is you've lost using it as a forgettable scratch space. Anything you put in the new Notepad now gets written to your drive, even if you don't save the file.
You can't type or copy/paste anything sensitive into notepad anymore as a temporary space even if you don't save the file.
I need any note taking app to require at least half a gigabyte of memory
I guess it's to direct more people to Microsoft 365 and Word. I hope that in reality more people will start to use LibreOffice and others.
I've used windows since dos and have never once used wordpad in my entire life.
For basic text, notepad is just fine. For anything fancy, wordpad isn't good enough.
I feel that it doesn't have a place anywhere. It's like the bizarre paint 3D they've recently discontinued.
iirc wordpad had spellcheck which was sort of convenient
My office had a period where we used LibreOffice and others because of some licensing dispute with Microsoft. However that period of peace ended when we migrated to 365.
Sad to see such a great program go…
More brilliant decisions from Satya Nadella. 🙄
It is an obvious maneuver, to be fair to Nadella. Not only will this push more over to subscription based word processing, but it also closes one of the easier avenues useds have to avoid aggregated data farming. Their next move should be to turn Notepad into a complementary tiered program:
Tier 1) Use at no charge, but your data pays for it instead.
Tier 2) Notepad becomes an extra pay to unlock feature of 365.
Sad but expected. Most people are using either office or one of the free alternatives by now.
idc what people say mswrite was always > wordpad > word
Now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time... A long time.
I wonder if anyone thought about looking up WordPal in the Microsoft Store and think about maybe that could be what it evolved into.
Problem is, it's not installed by default
I hope it's still included on future Windows server versions. It's quite useful to open documentation or instructions included with some software.
I suppose you could install Word. If you want just Word, you can jump through a few hoops to make the Office Deployment Tool install only Word.
I don't think that is a reasonable solution for your use case, but I suspect making people use (and buy) the actual Office Suite is the motivation.
Edit: I see my point has been phrased poorly - I was trying to outline that I suspect MS' point is making people get Word (Office) instead. Maybe I'm just plain wrong on that though.
Notepad ++ is one of the first things I install on any windows system
i was using it as a screen whenever i was leaving my computer unattended, when i used windows.
Omg i use this to open shitty word docs at work, to dont make it swap much, as the word is a memory hog
Pfew ... I moved to Linux just in time!
Gnome has already been ruined by a similar failed desire for a clean and simple interface.
That was decades ago, though.
Gnome has only gotten better imo
¯(ツ)_/¯
No longer available and no longer integrated are not equivocal.