Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!umich!samsung!munnari.oz.au!murdu!ucsvc!wehi!baxter_a
From: BAXTER_A@wehi.dn.mu.oz
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Amiga mentality cont'd
Message-ID: <6713@wehi.dn.mu.oz>
Date: 12 Apr 90 19:32:07 GMT
References: <1342@lpami.wimsey.bc.ca> <90098.170806JKT100@psuvm.psu.edu> <5561@sugar.hackercorp.com> <134305@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>
Organization: Walter & Eliza Hall Institute
Lines: 43

In article <134305@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>, fiddler@concertina.Sun.COM (Steve Hix) writes:
> 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> 
>> 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.
> 

It is, however easy to pin point the start of any successful implementation,
which was in 1974, when my father (Prof JE Baxter) visited Zerox as a
communications consultant to help Zerox rewrite the photocopier manuals
so people could understand them. He instead suggested that the "instructions"
be implicit in the machine design: ie. a green button for go (copy) a red
button for stop, a red light for error - preferably with a meaningful
picture of the error, and so on.
On that visit, he was invited to discuss ways of making computers more
accessible to laypeople, and suggested a similar thing:
A screen consisting of pictures that represented what "pushing" then might
achieve. I find it most amusing to remember my fathers confusion when
presented with a fully functional user interface. He just could not get
the hang of windows! "But that little square doesn't LOOK like it puts things
behind!!" he would thunder.
Oh well, another little piece of history.
Regards Alan

> ------------
> "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)