ClarisWorks has a most disappointing lack of System 7-savvy features - no Publish & Subscribe, no use of AppleEvents, no nothing that's not in System 6 except for balloon help. Claris also missed an excellent opportunity to exploit the "linked frames" feature. This could easily have been made into a simple outline tool or even a basic hypertext system. I'm disappointed that ClarisWorks has absolutely no integration with HyperCard. Given the obvious slant of ClarisWorks towards the educational market, it's baffling why Claris ignored any mention, hook, or other use of HyperCard. I see it as further proof that the HyperCard group at Claris is in a different time and space warp than the other developers.

In its manuals and promotions, Claris conveys the message that they see ClarisWorks as a gateway to "specialized" high-end products such as FileMaker Pro and Resolve. This makes it almost bizarre that ClarisWorks won't read or write to these file formats.

In these days of integrated applications, Claris has deferred integrating electronic mail - perhaps in anticipation of Apple's OCE project bearing fruit later in '92. I'm not sure they should have. Even a simple Mac-to-Mac mail utility would have significantly increased the gee-whiz quality of ClarisWorks, and would have helped integrate the Communications module into the rest of the application.