[NTLK] OT (sort of) on component software and the Newton

From: Joel M. Sciamma (joelsciamma_at_compuserve.com)
Date: Sat Oct 27 2001 - 21:25:21 EDT


Jon,

Last post on this subject I think...

> First of all, we have to look at these things and realize that they failed,
> not because of poor marketing or because of hostile forces, but because Apple
> made major blunders, either in the execution (Newton) or in the concept (Open
> Doc)...

The failure to communicate the worth of their products has certainly been a
factor as well as technical and managerial shortcomings.

> Before we go further, I want to address your assertion that we are allowing
> ourselves to be manipulated. If you want to see yourself as manipulated, or
> even see normal people being manipulated, go ahead, believe it. I have a bit
> of a higher opinion of people than that. This is something that some people
> have a hard time accepting, but the truth is, people are comfortable with
> the current situation, including the hassles that it brings...

Absolutely. I see only comfortable users, cruising through their work secure
in the knowledge that this is the best of all possible worlds :-)

We are manipulated because the lack of an open data environment allows
developers to hijack our data in the promotion of software upgrades. This is
a lever I find objectionable. Not all do this but enough to make it a
serious problem. The stagnation that has resulted in application design
benefits no one.

The Newton keeps the user's data sacred while also making it accessible. No
PC application can make this claim. Lost data due to error, poor design and
obsolescence is an established feature of the PC landscape.

The tremendous waste of time trying to locate a piece of data in 20GB of
various file formats is patently an absurd situation.

> To help illustrate, let's move the analogy out of the computer realm. I have
> a little tool, called a Leatherman. It is a knife, pliers, screwdrivers,
> saw, and I forget what else...

The sight of someone struggling to get to grips with current OS and
application designs does not suggest to me that things are moving in the
right direction. Achieving a fixed goal is getting harder not easier.
Productivity has hardly changed in the last 15 years as complexity and poor
design negate advances in other areas.

Having a dozen applications open while trying to move data between them and
achieve a coherent result is just about the most pitiable situation one
could imagine. The results of people's inabilty to cope with the demands
placed upon them by their computers arrive in my mailbox daily. Research
that Apple did clearly demonstrated that people were constantly confused as
to which application they were in, especially if no document was visible.
Hell, I still get lost occasionally.

The Newton at least reversed the trend by making the simple things simple.
On the personal computer very little is simple and when there may be 3-4
applications that can handle similar tasks (like image editing) one ends up
needing a vast array of similar tools because no single application is
enough. Not because they are feature poor (heaven preserve us) but usually
because of a fundamental misunderstanding of what the user needs to achieve.
The Leatherman analogy is a false one in support of your view because that
is exactly what you end up having but in atomised form with incompatible
file formats and enormous demands on computing resources.

And if having Photoshop, GraphicConverter, Illustrator, Acrobat and a WP
app. open simultaneously to build a document is somehow memory efficient,
then it's a usage of the words with which I was not previously familiar.

The direction that OS and application SW design is taking us is not a
healthy one and like all the big shifts that have happened in the past, it
is not clear what will replace what we have, but replaced it will need to
be.

As an inventor, I live daily with the need to communicate concepts that are
unfamiliar and disruptive. Very few people like it and huge, complex
arguments are constructed to justify the status quo. Our current mode of
computing is ossified and we need to ditch it and break the ties to the past
if we are to move to something better. Apple were nibbling away at these
issues but though incompetance, external pressures and lack of imagination
they blew it, and we lost out. No more Newton.

People may be reasonably satified with what they have because it the only
thing they have. The situation of separate application "islands" is merely
historical, not a result of enlightened thinking. So your solution is either
get on with IT as it is or don't do it at all (or use a Newt!).

The failures of individual products has nothing to do with the validity of
the concepts they embody. OD may have been flawed but it does not mean that
it can't be done better. The existence of this list seems like pretty good
evidence that Newton technology had a certain something which is proving
impossible to replicate and that people here treasure.

> P.S. I always sense an undercurrent in the discussion on component software
> that the real problem that people have, has more to do with economics than
> with computers. Huh?

I have no time for conspiracy theories, I can only relate what I heard from
those working in those organizations. They felt that if Apple wanted to
really promote component software then they would have to re-examine their
relationships.

The million eMates that would have been sold to Australia for their
education system and the deals that the briefly spun out Newton, Inc. had
made for the MP2K in vertical markets were a solid indication that the
technology had come of age, had found a footing and would begin to repay the
sums invested in them.

It's products like Mac OSX and Win XP that are the legacy systems, it's just
that most people haven't noticed yet.

Instead of boring everyone here to death let's continue this off-list if you
wish.

Regards,

Joel.

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