Xref: utzoo comp.sys.mac:13597 comp.windows.misc:194
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!eplrx7!lad
From: lad@eplrx7.UUCP (Lawrence A. Dziegielewski)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.windows.misc
Subject: Re: A/UX window systems, Mac toolbox, etc
Message-ID: <580@eplrx7.UUCP>
Date: 7 Mar 88 13:25:05 GMT
References: <507@ecrcvax.UUCP>
Organization: E.I. DuPont Co. Engineering Physics Lab
Lines: 39

From article <507@ecrcvax.UUCP>, by johng@ecrcvax.UUCP (John Gregor):
> In article <579@eplrx7.UUCP> lad@eplrx7.UUCP (Lawrence A. Dziegielewski) writes:
>>How can you say that the look and feel are being bypassed when nearly every
>>windowing system has either 'borrowed from'  or flat out copied the Mac user
>>interface.  There's MS Windows,  GEM,  and countless others who are riding
>>the coat tails of Apple foresight.  
> 
> Ummmm, excuse me, but wasn't a lot of that "Apple foresight" work that
> was pioneered by Xerox PARC about half a decade earlier?
> 
> I think the "Apple foresight" you mean is that they had the foresight to
> 'borrow from' or flat out copy PARC's work before DRI.

I have never stated that Apple invented pull-down menus or icons.  Steve
Jobs spent a great deal of time at PARC in the early days observing their
work with user interfacing and windowing systems.  Alot of what Steve saw
there ended up in the Finder, and I beleive that no one denies that.
However,  Steve and Apple (and Andy Hertzfeld) made it easier to use than
the PARC interface.  Andy added a "Toolbox" of routines which transformed
the Mac from 'just another computer with windows' to *the* user interface 
standard which others would soon follow.  And don't forget 
the Mac was the first 'commercially available' personal computer
to feature a windowing interface and a secondary input device known as a
mouse.  The rest of the world laughed at the Mac.  I bought mine home in
March of 1984 and all of my esteemed computer friends wanted to come over
and 'play with the toy'.  

It seems odd that shortly after 'the toy' hit the streets every other PC
maker wanted windows,  and a mouse,  and started copying it.  And that's
what I refer to as 'borrowing from'.  Apple had the foresight that the other
computer companies didn't.  Until,  of course,  Apple starting having
success with the Mac.  Everybody else wanted in then.


-- 
        Lawrence A. Dziegielewski       |       E.I. Dupont Co.
        uunet!eplrx7!lad                |       Engineering Physics Lab
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