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sallot@mi*.co* wrote:

> And the mac is a pathetic attempt to emulate the X desktop developed by
> Xerox Parc. So, what's this have to do with cave diving anyway?

Good Point. So why'd you comment? I thought that the thread was dead.

As long as we're on the subject, the Xerox Parc interface was hot for its time,
but compared even to today's Windoze it was lame. It lacked pull-down menus,
cut-and-paste and many other features that were created with the LISA and later
the MAC. It did contain all the basic elements of a "modern" OS, but lacked its
subtleties. But it is where Jobs saw the future and had the good sense to run
with it. Xerox saw the same thing and after some expensive attempts, shelved it
in part because they was being sued by everyone for restraint of trade et al,
just as Microsoft is today. The biggest difference is, Xerox's computer
division actually invented some things themselves.

And Apple didn't "steal" the OS. That ignores the brilliance of the Apple team
that devoloped the LISA and the MAC. You don't even have to read carefully to
figure that out. Jobs and his team simply saw that this was the future in two
visits and turned the entire Apple focus after some infighting created a
GUI-driven computer interface that has been the best and most intuitive since
its inception and still is today. Windoze is OK, it just isn't a MAC.

The Alto did have one thing the MAC didn't have: ethernet.

Have a look at at an interesting BYTE article about the ALTO:

http://www.byte.com/art/9609/sec4/art3.htm

and the story of how Apple came to see the ALTO and what happened next:

http://www.macspeedzone.com/articles/appleconfidential/xeroxandapple.html


Get your facts straight or don't speak.

Later,

JoeL

   ------"Zed's dead, baby."

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