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Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!ames!pacbell!att!cuuxb!dlm
From: dlm@cuuxb.ATT.COM (Dennis L. Mumaugh)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.misc,comp.sys.next,comp.sys.mac,comp.windows.ms,comp.windows.x,alt.cyberpunk,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.misc
Subject: Re: replacing the desktop metaphor
Keywords: desktop metaphor, graphical interfaces, computing environments
Message-ID: <2350@cuuxb.ATT.COM>
Date: 7 Jan 89 02:41:17 GMT
References: <4362@pitt.UUCP>
Reply-To: dlm@cuuxb.UUCP (Dennis L. Mumaugh)
Organization: ATT Data Systems Group, Lisle, Ill.
Lines: 44

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.  Four years ago, Apple 
>had something with the Macintosh desktop: a new way to think about 
>computing.  Now, everyone is copying the desktop: Microsoft, IBM, 
>AT&T.  Even the new NeXT machine provides little more than a 
>desktop with some cute simulated depth.
>

I suggest all people who are involved with Information Technology be
required to read the following article before being allowed to
post netnews:

%A Vannevar Bush
%T As We May Think
%J Altantic Monthly
%D August 21945
%X This article described an information
handling workstation of the future, at which a user could sit and browse
information which would appear on rear-projection screens;  links between
places in different documents would connect related information, and the
machine would be able to switch over to those related documents if they
were stored on the system (a concept today called "hypertext").
.br
This article also describes the concept of intertextual links {margin
notes} that became part of the documents and allow establishing
correlations and cross-references.  It also posited the concept of an
information space and a world-wide data space.

My point is that the above citation seems to be unknown to serious
researchers.  It describes a set of concepts that have not yet been
achieved.   A vague glimmering was attempted by Doug Englebert at SRI
in his Augmented Knowledge Workshop.   I feel that people need to
re-examine a lot of the past as I seem to see people keep re-inventing
old ideas that have become forgotten.

Of course, one should remember that had not Alfred Einstein been
around Vannevar Bush would have been the most famous scientist in the
USA.   It isn't surprising that his idea was so seminal.

-- 
=Dennis L. Mumaugh
 Lisle, IL       ...!{att,lll-crg}!cuuxb!dlm  OR cuuxb!dlm@arpa.att.com