This dissertation is an inquiry into the history of Chinese computer-based word processing technologies from 1958 to 1997. My purpose in looking into the history is to answer, how the development and usage of word-processing technologies have contributed to knowledge production, by shaping the understanding of what information technologies can do. Coming from a background of artistic research, my inquiry gravitates towards two topical interests: the implementation of Chinese typography design in MS 2400, the digital word processor from the mid-1980s, and the DIY history of Chinese word editor software and multimedia publishing software crafted by author and computer programmer Wang Xiaobo. Wang considered these media as alternative environments and channels to produce and distribute his novels. To conduct my inquiry, I use a combination of theoretical research and praxis methods: discourse networks analysis, media archaeology, the material history of text, software studies, electronic literature, and lastly experimental archival praxis. My first finding is that the implementation of Chinese typography in early digital word processors is a negotiation between computer processing capacity, aesthetics of the typography, and legibility presented for the reader. My second finding is that when Wang Xiaobo wrote novels and developed software side-by-side, the two activities came to intertwine with each other. Wang Xiaobo's contact with news from the U.S., also supported him with the resources and vision to realize a DIY project. My dissertation is a unique body of knowledge on the systems of writing things down with computer-based information technologies across writing, printing, distributing, and publishing in the later half of the twentieth century. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]