MacAnova development began in 1987 by Gary W. Oehlert with the goal of producing a free package for use in class that would do "GLIM-like computations with an S-like syntax in a Macintosh environment". The syntax was a strict subset of old, old S. Both MacAnova and S have evolved independently since then, and while they retain a family resemblence, there are many differences.

DOS and Unix implementations of MacAnova followed shortly after the Macintosh version. Christopher Bingham joined the project and incorporated many features of MATTER, an interactive package on Cyber computers. He has been the lead developer since version 3. Gary Oehlert developed the new graphical interface that appeared in version 5.00. The current version is 5.03.

A history of major changes in the various releases of MacAnova is available. You can get similar information within MacAnova via help(news) and/or help(updates).