Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncrcae!hubcap!gatech!rutgers!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!uccba!uceng!dmocsny
From: dmocsny@uceng.UC.EDU (daniel mocsny)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: Hundreds of books on an optical disk
Summary: 2020 A.D.
Message-ID: <398@uceng.UC.EDU>
Date: 8 Nov 88 18:46:09 GMT
References: <0XMtqn087E-0A14EYk@andrew.cmu.edu> <344@uceng.UC.EDU> <13203@andante.UUCP>
Organization: Univ. of Cincinnati, College of Engg.
Lines: 69

In article <13203@andante.UUCP>, prem@andante.UUCP (Swami Devanbu) writes:
> When I read a book, I want to curl up in a comfy chair, with a blanket
> around me, a bowl of curried popcorn, and a pot of tea. 
> 
> A computer is a computer and a book is a book. 

An amateur historian is completing a study on the origins of networked
civilizations. She is working diligently in her favorite location --
in a small rowboat floating in a farmpond. Being something of a
traditionalist, she has so far resisted the temptation to get the
brain stem implants so many of her friends are raving about. She's
still sticking with the fast-obsoleting virtual workstation hardware.

She wears a translucent pair of wrap-around goggles. These display a
pair of binocular images to her, each with pixel and color resolution
matching her visual acuity. The goggles provide a field of view as wide
as her visual arc. Head-motion sensors in the goggles send
information to her pocket-sized 100 GIPS computer. The computer uses
this information to pan the displays to cancel her head motion, so she
has the convincing impression of being inside a virtual environment.
She can interact with objects in the environment by moving her hands
in a natural way. She is wearing a thin pair of gloves that report
her hand motion to the computer. The computer projects an image of
her hands in the virtual environment and adjusts virtual objects 
as she manipulates them. The goggles also track her eye motion, so
she can point to objects simply by looking at them and speaking commands
(the computer recognizes her speech).

To perform her study, she whispers to her computer, ``historical
archives.''  The computer creates an animated representation of
sailing over a city and landing before a large building. She floats
inside and settles at a wide mahogany table. She starts naming off
topics of interest, the corresponding virtual books float out of their
virtual shelves, glide to her, open themselves to the pages of interest,
and float before her. With a practiced flurry of glances and gestures,
she arranges them to her liking, scans a few documents, and begins to
dictate her thoughts.

As her essay ranges to other topics, her computer suggests additional
reference material. At one point she is reviewing an archived discussion
from the historically significant Usenet. She stumbles upon a thread
relating to the early efforts to place printed materials on optical
disks. She reads a few quotes and marvels at how quaint they sound
in retrospect. Imagine, real paper books!

She recalls seeing a few at a museum, carefully stored under nitrogen
beneath thick glass. How her predecessors must have struggled with
them...they looked so heavy, so bulky, so clumsy, and above all, so
inflexible! Having data in a static form, how could one search it,
extract portions for comment, analysis, or elaboration? What if a book
contained errors? How was one to locate all the copies and notify
their owners? How could one simultaneously view a hundred of them? How
could one possibly have enough on hand to do any serious work? How to
write anything at all, never having assurance that one's readers would
have immediate access to all the necessary background material? She
speculates that the hapless writers of the past either had to speak
hopelessly above most reader's heads or else painstakingly repeat
information already available elsewhere. No wonder progress had been
so slow! With hordes of people duplicating each other's efforts, that
progress had occurred at all was amazing. And how was anyone to read
comfortably? Fumbling with turning pages, struggling to to get the
correct lighting...could those people have read anything while
lying in bed? She struggles with the idea momentarily, then gives up.

Wearying with her thoughts and labors, she tells her computer to
save her work environment. She will return to it later. She pulls
off her goggles and gloves, and slides them into a case on her belt. 
She seizes the oars, and slowly makes for shore.

Dan Mocsny