Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!snorkelwacker!apple!sun-barr!newstop!sun!concertina!fiddler
From: fiddler@concertina.Sun.COM (Steve Hix)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Amiga mentality cont'd
Message-ID: <134305@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>
Date: 11 Apr 90 18:45:40 GMT
References: <1342@lpami.wimsey.bc.ca> <90098.170806JKT100@psuvm.psu.edu> <5561@sugar.hackercorp.com>
Sender: news@sun.Eng.Sun.COM
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In article <5561@sugar.hackercorp.com>, karl@sugar.hackercorp.com (Karl Lehenbauer) writes:
> 
> Oh, please.  Apple didn't invent GUIs, Xerox did.  

Even Xerox wasn't the first.  There was substantial work being done at
various universities.  Xerox was among the first to have a shot at a
commercial success with one though...even though they blew their chance.
Xerox depended on p[revious work done in universities and places like
SRI with people like Evans and Sutherland and Doug Englebart.

> And Apple's implementation substantially degraded their power.

Depends on which system you refer to...the 128K Mac, certainly.

> Xerox's multitasked and included an integrated object-oriented
> programming environment as well, and that was 15+ years ago, to boot.

So did the Lisa, though it wasn't quite as long ago.  It would have been
a pretty nice system, given something faster than a 7MHz 68000.  Say, a
40MHz '030?

It's hard to point out when a particular idea first occurred, partly 
because of poor historical records, partly because nobody was working
in a vacuum.

A given idea doesn't spring full-formed in an instant, Greek mythology
notwithstanding, and it's hard to say where or when the initial starting
point was reached.

------------
"Up the airey mountain, down the rushy glen,
   we daren't go a-hunting for fear of little men..."
('cause Fish and Game has taken to hiring axe-carrying dwarves)