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Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!athena.mit.edu!chekmate
From: chekmate@athena.mit.edu (Adam Kao)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.windows.misc
Subject: Re: A/UX window systems, Mac tool...( Hum Interface)
Message-ID: <3609@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU>
Date: 9 Mar 88 22:38:28 GMT
References: <4129@hoptoad.uucp> <283@rhesus.primate.wisc.edu> <1710@ssc-vax.UUCP> <9829@steinmetz.steinmetz.UUCP> <7593@apple.Apple.Com>
Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU
Reply-To: chekmate@athena.mit.edu (Adam Kao)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 44
Keywords: window human computer interface

In article <7593@apple.Apple.Com> dwb@Apple.COM (David W. Berry) writes:
>	Multifinder is multitasking, by all the requirements you've given.

Ah yes, the old, "if it walks like a duck . . ." argument.  But I
think in this case the argument is actually "Well it almost walks like
a duck, and it almost looks like a duck, and it almost quacks like a
duck."  I hope you'll understand if in this case I'd rather have a
real duck (roasted, please :-)).

Multitasking is a simple, neat idea that resulted in major gains in
productivity.  Multifinder is an attempt to give the Mac some of the
greatest benefits of multitasking.  Seeing as how the Mac has
single-tasking written all over its OS I don't see how Multifinder
can be anything but large and complicated.  In other words:
---> IT'S A HACK. <---
A great hack, probably, but a hack.

David admits there are areas where Multifinder is less than
multitasking.  I know of no areas where multitasking is less
convenient than Multifinder.

In fact who's to say there aren't other areas we haven't thought of,
because we aren't clever enough?  Multitasking is a _new_way_of_
_using_ that little box on your desk.  Simple ideas inevitably get
used in ways their originators never thought of.  Multifinder is a
specialized simulation of multitasking, and you'd have to extend it if
you wanted to simulate some aspect you forgot about.  Okay, I guess
what I have here is an existence proof without the existence.  But try
reversing my argument.  "Multitasking is a specialized simulation of
Multifinder."  Doesn't that sound a little ridiculous to you?  Doesn't
that imply there's some asymmetry here?

People keep saying Multifinder can do what multitasking does.  But
there is at least one thing multitasking has over Multifinder:
generality and simplicity (was that two?  Or really one?  never mind).
What does Multifinder have over multitasking?  In other words:
---> WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO USE MULTIFINDER??? <---

What's that?  Mac software?  Who cares about Mac software?

Adam

disclaimer:  MIT lets me use their equipment because I pay them
$12,500 a year.