the chief cursor diamond commands mentioned in this article. Another WordStar emulation utility is 'WordStar Command Emulator for Microsoft Word', also known as 'WordStar for Word,' by Mike Petrie. Designed to work in conjunction with CtrlPlus, the Command Emulator adds many more WordStar commands to MS Word than CtrlPlus by itself, and also changes Word 97-XP's menus to be more like those of WordStar 7.0 for DOS, the last DOS version of WordStar. For example, Ctrl+K? was WordStar's word count command and Ctrl+QL was its spell check command. Hitting these commands in the WordStar Emulator within Word runs Word's equivalent commands. WordStar for Word also adds WordStar's block commands, namely Ctrl+KB to mark the beginning of a block, Ctrl+KK to mark the end, and Ctrl+KV to move it. Alternatively, Ctrl+KC could be used to copy the block. WordStar for Word works on all versions of Word from Word 97 through 2010. The WordStar Command Emulator is written in Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications, a macro programming language based on Visual Basic built into Microsoft Word to allow for a high level of customization. Most Word add-ins are written in this language also known as VBA. GNU Emacs used to come with a library 'wordstar-mode.el' that provides WordStar emulation, but it's been declared obsolete as of version 24.5. A macro set for vi that provides WordStar emulation is available. The cross-platform JOE editor is a very WordStar-like alternative. When invoked as jstar Joe emulates many WordStar keybindings. JOE lacks formatting options and essentially only operates in nondocument mode, but formatted documents can be authored in HTML/CSS, Markdown or another markup language. Bidirectional text Around 1978 Elbit Systems in Israel developed a CP/M capable microcomputer named the DS2100. CP/M machines were readily available and Elbit needed something to differentiate their product from others. An agreement was made with MicroPro to develop a version of WordStar that supported both English and Hebrew input. The concept was revolutionary, as Hebrew is written right-to-left and all word processors of the time assumed left-to-right. WordStar, as developed by Elbit, was the first word processor that offered bi-directional input and mixed alphabets. Elbit acquired rights to the source code and a development team in Elbit, Haifa, worked on the project. For several years Hebrew-English WordStar was the de facto WYSIWYG word processor leader until, inevitably, it was ousted by younger competitors. Filename extensions DOS WordStar files by