Xref: utzoo comp.windows.misc:801 comp.sys.next:999 comp.sys.mac:24352 alt.cyberpunk:1187
Path: utzoo!utgpu!bnr-vpa!bnr-rsc!dgbt!cognos!roberts
From: roberts@cognos.uucp (Robert Stanley)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.misc,comp.sys.next,comp.sys.mac,alt.cyberpunk
Subject: Re: replacing the desktop metaphor
Keywords: desktop metaphor, graphical interfaces, computing environments
Message-ID: <4920@cognos.UUCP>
Date: 22 Dec 88 14:53:15 GMT
References: <4362@pitt.UUCP> <257@gloom.UUCP>
Reply-To: roberts@cognos.UUCP (Robert Stanley)
Organization: Cognos Inc., Ottawa, Canada
Lines: 61

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?

>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).

The HyperCard Navigator II stack is an interesting experimental example of
structuring a familiar metaphor for the work space.  It presents a full
office, complete with a desk which has both a desktop and a set of drawers
for files and for miscellaneous bits and pieces.  It is clearly a richer
metaphor than the simple desktop, even though this example is full of
cutsie-pie off-the-cuff symbology which turns out not to completely capable
of generalization.  (Some of the symbols work, some don't, and most are
specific rather than generic.  Of course, with HyperCard you can roll your
own anyway, so perhaps this is a specious argument).  However, in keeping
with the concept of HyperCard as a personal data-access manager, there is
no provision in the Navigator II example to wander out of your office.  It
ought to be real easy to do, however (just another card, right?), and tied
into AppleTalk (sorry, LocalTalk) there are some nice possibilities.

The big, big problem with any of this stuff is that in order for environment
A to report to its user what is going on in environment B absolutely requires
environment B to expend some resource in telling environment A what is
going on.  What is more, this has to be done when environment A wants it,
not when it is "convenient" for environment B.  In practical terms, it must
be possible for any active environment to continuously support a back-
ground task with the sole purpose of supplying local information to remote
requestors.  Not impossible, but it raises the spectre of security, and
it's not the nicest kind of app to try and write on the Mac, even under
multi-finder.

On the subject of how such a metaphor might actually work, there are
currently a couple of interesting lines of work at Xerox (remember them?
Created that Star thingy...): they are devoting considerable attention to
the whole field of computer support for co-operative working, and on the
Interlisp machines they have a really interesting meta-windowing system
known as Rooms.  Each full-screen display is simply a room, and a meta-
navigational system allows you to open and close doors between rooms, and
to move from room to room.  I am too lazy to open my filing cabinet and
look right now, but if anyone cares I can dig out formal references.
There's lots of stuff on rooms, which you can buy if you have the right
kind of hardware, and the co-operative working was shown as one of the
video sessions at the Washington DC 'CHI conference earlier this year.

Robert_S
-- 
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