From: jesper@harry.xanthus.se (Jesper Lundh)
Subject: Xanthus Announces Questor Spreadsheet for NeXTSTEP
Keywords: Xanthus, Questor, Spreadsheet
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Kista
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 15:55:49 GMT


              Xanthus International Announces

                       Questor

- the State-of-the-art Spreadsheet Application for NeXTSTEP

Stockholm, November 17, 1992 - Xanthus International AB today announced  
Questor, its spreadsheet application for the NeXTSTEP computing  
environment.

Aimed at everybody that has been waiting for a high quality matrix-based  
spreadsheet application tailored for the NeXTSTEP environment, Questor  
offers the ease-of-use of traditional spreadsheet applications combined  
with the extra power offered by NeXTSTEP.

For example, Questor can easily retrieve data from relational databases  
like Oracle and Sybase using the Database Kit in NeXSTEP and display the  
data in full color charts that can be placed in other documents and  
automatically updated by the Object Linking mechanism of NeXTSTEP. 

"Questor brings the power of the Database Kit to everybody," says Jesper  
Lundh, marketing manager at Xanthus."Questor will increase the  
productivity of anybody with a computer running NeXTSTEP on their desk."

Questor is the perfect tool for all the things traditionally done with  
spreadsheet applications, like budgets, scientific calculations, creating  
tables and charts for presentations etc. In addition to the basic  
spreadsheet power, Questor comes with user interface objects like buttons  
and sliders as well as a powerful and easy-to-use scripting language  
called QScript. These tools will allow users to customize spreadsheets to  
perform very specific tasks.

The open architecture of Questor, with an extremely powerful API, also  
lets users control spreadsheets from other applications written in  
objective-C and Questor to control any other application with a  
Speaker/Listener interface through the QScript language.

Selected Questor features:

- A structured scripting language - QScript with an "intelligent" editor  
including automatic pretty-printing and programming support. QScript  
allows you to customize your spreadsheet to perform very specific tasks.

- Input controllers like buttons, text-fields and sliders can be  
drag-and-dropped anywhere on the spreadsheet and connected to QScript code  
or directly to cells by control-dragging.

- Images and sound can be drag-and-dropped anywhere on the spreadsheet to  
create stunning documents including graphics and sound effects.

- "Output objects" like charts and gauges can be drag-and-dropped anywhere  
on the spreadsheet and be connected to cell areas by control-dragging for  
continuous updating.

- Drawing tools that allows you to draw directly on the spreadsheet.

- Seamless connections to relational databases like Oracle and Sybase  
using the Database Kit in NeXTSTEP.

- A powerful double-directed API that allows Questor to easily control and  
exchange data with other applications.

- External functions can be written in C or in QScript and be loaded into  
Questor for easy extensibility.

- A ToolBox that includes object palettes and a number of other tools that  
removes the need of modal panels for filling, searching and sorting data.  
The ToolBox also includes complete scripting support.

- Full support for user palettes. Users can easily create new palettes  
with customized charts, graphics and control objects. 

- Full support for Lotus 1-2-3 bracket-macros. 

- Unlimited undo.

- Full support for object linking.

- The Questor QScript Debugger which allows functions to be debugged in a  
seamless manner.

- The Questor Macro Stepper which allows macros to be debugged on  
different levels of granularity.

- Basic support for multi-user access. Several users can look at the same  
document, but only one can open it in read/write mode. Users with a  
document opened in read-only mode are notified as soon as the disk version  
of the document changes. 

Questor is now beta tested at selected beta sites.

Questor will be available Q1 1993 through selected resellers worldwide.

For more information please contact questor@xanthus.se

Xanthus International, headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, is a privately  
owned software development company that specializes in the NeXTSTEP  
platform. Questor is the fourth in a series of general-purpose  
productivity tools for NeXTSTEP. In May 1992, Xanthus started to ship its  
first product CraftMan, the multimedia programming tool for the NeXT  
computer. The second product was LaserMan, a tool for controlling Laser  
Disc Players and other devices from a NeXT computer.  The third product  
was SplitBuilder/Receiver, a tool for sending large files via NeXTmail.  
LaserMan and SplitBuilder/Receiver started to ship in September 1992.  
Xanthus International was founded in 1990.