On 12/13/99 10:41 AM, bpearce@cloud9.net [mailto:bpearce@cloud9.net]
wrote:
>>1. sometime ago one guy wrote to list that microsoft hired xerox parc's
>>veterans (what _names_i_don't know? maybe like larry tesler) to develope
>>new generation of pen-based tablet ("pen computer"). i have lost my copy of
>>this thread. maybe someone post it to me or have another detailed
>>information about that event/news?
>
>I posted the article, which is still available for purchase from The New
>York Times on the Web for about US $2.50. (It first appeared around
>mid-to-late August, I believe.) Unfortunately, I've long since discarded
>my copy (I couldn't even recall who the two people involved were) and I
>don't think the list was being archived at that point. And that's the last
>I've heard of it.
>
>BRIAN/bpearce@cloud9.net
Here it is from my digest archives:
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 1999 14:57:28 -0400
From: Brian Pearce <bpearce@cloud9.net>
To: newtontalk@planetnewton.com
Subject: Microsoft's Tablet (from The New York Times)
Message-ID: <v04205503b3f1d56badaf@[168.100.208.119]>
I'll be damned if I'm going to pay $2.50 to read a piece from
*yesterday's*=
paper without sharing it with someone else...
BRIAN/bpearce@cloud9.net
_______________
Microsoft Brings In Top Talent To Pursue Old Goal: The Tablet
By JOHN MARKOFF
Hoping to fulfill a dream that has eluded the industry for nearly three=
decades, a team of designers from the Microsoft Corporation is trying to=
create a so-called tablet computer. The portable, wireless, keyboardless=
device would be about the size and weight of a writing tablet and be=
intended to serve most of a person's everyday computing and Net-surfing
nee=
ds.
Microsoft, which has no set timetable or manufacturing plans for the
tablet=
computer, knows that success is far from certain. ''This is a long-haul=
effort and the road in the past has been fraught with conspicuous=
failures,'' said Dick Brass, the company's vice president for emerging
tech=
nologies.
But betting that past computer-tablet stumbles like AT&T's Eo and Apple=
Computer's Newton were simply ideas too far ahead of their technological=
times, Microsoft has bolstered its team with two legendary computer=
innovators, Butler Lampson and Chuck Thacker.
The pair were part of a group that helped pioneer some of the most
important=
ideas in the personal computer industry back in the 1970's as
researchers=
at the Xerox Corporation's Palo Alto Research Center in California. It
was=
at PARC that such innovations as the computer mouse, the Ethernet PC=
networking system and the what-you-see-is-what-you-get screen display
for=
word processing were developed -- although it would be other companies,=
like Apple, the 3Com Corporation and Microsoft that would turn those
ideas=
into commercially viable products.
One PARC concept from that era that has yet to bear commercial fruit,=
however, is the tablet computer, though no one is blaming Mr. Lampson
and=
Mr. Thacker.
''If they're going to take another whack at this, there aren't two better=
guys to do it,'' said John Shoch, a former member of the Xerox PARC team=
who is now a venture capitalist. ''Butler and Chuck are superb designers
in=
the broadest sense of the word.''
Mr. Thacker, for his part, says that idea of a tablet computer may now be=
ripe enough to bear fruit. ''This has been something that people have
been=
taking runs at for almost 30 years now,'' he said. ''But the confluence
of=
technologies is happening that may finally make it possible.''
Mr. Thacker, 56, and Mr. Lampson, 55, were part of a group, led by the=
computer scientist Alan Kay, that set out in 1971 to build a portable=
computing machine they called a Dynabook that would enable a user to
stay=
wirelessly connected to a world of information. As graduate student at
the=
University of Utah, Mr. Kay had written his doctoral thesis about such a=
machine, which he then called the Sketchpad.
''I remember people telling Alan he was crazy,'' said Adele Goldberg, who=
helped manage the Xerox PARC effort and is now a Silicon Valley software=
developer and consultant. (Mr. Kay is now a researcher at the Walt
Disney=
Company's Imagineering laboratory.) ''We look back and think, well, we
were=
just a little too early,'' Ms. Goldberg said.
The PARC group developed a programming system called Smalltalk and a
series=
of prototype computers that they referred to as ''interim Dynabooks.''
But=
these efforts, like commercial flops that followed, were hampered by=
limitations of the software and hardware arts at the time.
In the past few years, however, the success of the 3Com's hand-held Palm=
Pilot ''digital assistants'' -- which use simple handwriting
recognition,=
perform simple computing and have rudimentary communications
capabilities=
-- have helped revived industry hopes for a more powerful, full-fledged=
tablet computer.
''We're trying to see if we can produce a tablet PC and the software for
it=
that will be sufficiently powerful and intuitive and inexpensive to
capture=
the imagination and the marketplace,'' said Mr. Brass, who formed the=
Microsoft tablet team in March and last month recruited Mr. Lampson and
Mr.=
Thacker from other parts of the company.
A portable tablet computer might finally be able to replace the keyboards
of=
today's portable machines with either handwriting or speech input, Mr.=
Brass said.
He acknowledged past commercial failures, including Apple's Newton, the
Go=
Corporation (whose technology was used in the abortive AT&T Eo) and even
a=
Microsoft project of a decade ago called Pen Windows. But Mr. Brass said=
the time might now be right to build a kind of computer that many
computer=
executives, including William H. Gates, Microsoft's chairman, have said=
will eventually replace the current desktop standard.
''A lot of things have changed,'' Mr. Brass said. ''Display technology
has=
gotten cheaper and the processors are now probably fast enough.''
Mr. Brass -- who was an early software developer in the personal computer=
industry and then a vice president at the data-base software giant, the=
Oracle Corporation -- joined Microsoft two years ago to lead an
electronic=
book effort. Part of that work has included the company's recently=
introduced Cleartype, a software approach to improving the readability
of=
fonts on flat panel computer displays -- whether electronic books or=
portable computers.
With Microsoft set to announce its electronic book plans this week at the=
Seybold Publishing Conference technology conference in San Francisco,
Mr.=
Brass said that he had been shifting his focus recently to the company's=
effort to design a new class of computer embodying many of the features=
envisioned in the original Xerox Dynabook.
It was only late last month that he asked Mr. Lampson and Mr. Thacker to=
join the tablet team.
Mr. Thacker, who left a position at the Digital Equipment Corporation=
laboratory in Palo Alto to join Microsoft two years ago, has been
working=
at a new Microsoft research laboratory he helped set up in Britain. Mr.=
Lampson, who also previously worked at Digital Equipment, came to
Microsoft=
four years ago to work with Nathan Myhrvold, who recently took a leave
of=
absence as the company's head of research.
Microsoft has no plans to begin manufacturing computers, Mr. Brass said.
But=
if the tablet effort succeeds, he said, the company will probably form=
partnerships with hardware companies to build and sell the systems.
The new tablet project is small by Microsoft standards, said another=
Microsoft developer who spoke on condition that he not be identified. He=
said it was not yet clear whether the research project would garner the=
resources that Microsoft throws at major projects, which frequently
involve=
hundreds of developers.
But Mr. Thacker, who was one of the two principal hardware designers of
the=
Xerox Alto, a prototype computer that was the first ''interim
Dynabook,''=
does not seem concerned about whether Microsoft is committed to this
effort=
=2E
''I've always wanted this kind of device,'' he said, ''and in systems=
research one of the most motivating things is that you want the device
your=
self.''
And now, many people in the computer industry and at Microsoft believe
that=
there is a convergence of a number of technologies, including display,=
processing, battery and storage that will finally pave the way for=
commercial tablet computers.
Tablet computing will be pervasive, Mr. Lampson said. ''I think this will
be=
the way most people interact with the Net and with the rest of the=
computing universe as well.''
============= END ARTICLE ========
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