Xref: utzoo comp.windows.misc:776 comp.sys.next:947 comp.sys.mac:24259
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!mailrus!ncar!noao!arizona!naucse!kwc
From: kwc@naucse.UUCP (Ken Collier)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.misc,comp.sys.next,comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: replacing the desktop metaphor
Summary: Better than 3-D
Keywords: desktop metaphor, graphical interfaces, computing environments
Message-ID: <1077@naucse.UUCP>
Date: 21 Dec 88 17:58:31 GMT
References: <4362@pitt.UUCP> <257@gloom.UUCP>
Organization: Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ
Lines: 40

In article <257@gloom.UUCP>, cory@gloom.UUCP (Cory Kempf) writes:
> In article <4362@pitt.UUCP> bonar@pitt.UUCP (Dr. Jeffrey Bonar) writes:
> >
> >I have an invitation for net readers - create a metaphor for computing 
> >systems that goes beyond the desktop cliche.
> [...]
> >						what should a computer work 
> >space really look like?
> >
> >William Gibson described a cyberspace...
> 
> What I would like to see is the desktop metaphor extended into 3D, say
> for example, an office.  You would have a desktop, a trashcan, a phone,
> an inbasket/outbasket, a filesystem, etc.  Each of the services that are 
> offered by the system are represented as an object in the office.  If you 
> go out through the door, you find yourself in the hall (network), and from 
> there can go into someone else's office (the outbasket & phone act in a 
> predictable manner).

To take your idea a bit further how about getting rid of the CRT display
and creating a holographic display which could be projected anywhere 
in your office (or workspace) that is convenient.  When your computer is
not in use (if that is possible) none of your desk space would be taken up.

You would even be able
to determine the metaphor that gets projected.  Say, Cory's idea of the 
office with the doors and hallways, etc.  Or possibly a "zoomed" view of
the desktop with all of it's accouterments.  Manipulation of this projection
would be the user's choice of a standard keyboard or some sort of pointing
device.  Perhaps we could even come up with a way that the user could 
physically manipulate the holographic characters.  

Remember the chess game in one of the Star Wars movies, where the holographic
images battled one another until one was "killed"?  If Lucas Films can
do it, it must be possible! :-)

Ken Collier
College of Engineering and Technology
Northern Arizona University
Flagstaff, Arizona