Path: utzoo!hoptoad!amdcad!apple!bloom-beacon!bu-cs!encore!bzs@encore.com
From: bzs@encore.com (Barry Shein)
Newsgroups: alt.next
Subject: Re: I've seen it!
Message-ID: <4061@encore.UUCP>
Date: 31 Oct 88 20:44:41 GMT
References: <4179@umd5.umd.edu> <1075@muddcs.Claremont.EDU>
Sender: news@encore.UUCP
Reply-To: bzs@encore.com (Barry Shein)
Distribution: alt
Organization: Encore Computer Corp
Lines: 33
In-reply-to: dhosek@jarthur.Claremont.EDU (Donald Hosek)

>Even more important to consider is, how useful is it to have color on the
>display if you can't print in color? Sure it might *look* nice to have
>display color, but is it really something that one *needs*? I think not.
>
>-dh

Wait a minute, not everything that gets displayed on a screen is
destined to be printed (besides, you can print in color, there are
several good color printers on the market and some not very expensive,
I believe under $10K, maybe not a home item but certainly office or
lab priced.)

I remember several years ago seeing a demo of a network monitoring
system at BBN which used color character terminals. Basically, as
certain conditions were noticed by the software items on the screen
would move thru the colors green/yellow/red or thereabouts. As might
be expected yellow was some warning condition and red indicated that
the monitoring software had detected a real problem. A lot of the
time the screens just flickered various stats on the networks in
blue.

The obvious advantage was that an operator could sit in a room with a
dozen of these monitoring stations and just scan them from across the
room every so often. Any yellow/red demanded more attention, none, go
back to the crossword puzzle.

I can't think of any other very good way to do something like this
although I suppose various highlight attributes (bold, blinking) might
be useful, then again these may have also used those as well.

Anyhow, information is information.

	-Barry Shein, ||Encore||