SCO Office Suite: Word processing, spreadsheet, and database – three now-common business applications all running on SCO XENIX/UNIX.

As one of the first employees of The Santa Cruz Operation (SCO), my job morphed almost continuously during my tenure there. It was my first job out of college, starting on the office staff then quickly becoming the paralegal since I was the only one in the office who knew how to use vi (all the documents were written using nroff). I soon became product manager for SCO’s office applications.

When SCO started working on a word processor to sell with SCO Xenix to business users, I was tasked with converting all the legal documents over to the new system: enabling the rest of the staff to be able to edit them and acting as the primary tester. There is nothing more character-building than doing critical business tasks using pre-alpha software!

As the only non-programmer working on the team, I became both the in-house expert as well as the canonical user and lead tester. Doing product demonstrations, talking to potential customers, gathering feedback from other users (both in-house and in-the-field), I was the company’s first product manager – I even got to name the product! When other office products were brought in my role expanded to cover them as well: Multiplan (spreadsheet) and Informix (database).

This was my first foray into product management, and first experience working on packaged software. These business-critical applications were essential to SCO’s market positioning and sales. It was an exciting time to have this opportunity: establishing a user-centered approach to the design of software previously the exclusive domain of the programmers.

Company: The Santa Cruz Operation
Position: Product Manager
Technologies: UNIX

References:
Original Lyrix Ad
Lyrix Product Sheet
Informix Product Sheet
Multiplan Product Sheet