Native GUI Squeak?

Jochen F. Rick nadja at cc.gatech.edu
Sat Feb 17 19:29:12 UTC 2001


Alan Kay wrote:
> I meant this in part, but I mainly meant that the WEB, bad as it is, 
> willy nilly broke people's perception that the only UI that was or 
> could be was Windows. And, further, it should give us motivation to 
> REALLY go after the possibilities of the Internet and the much richer 
> interfaces yet to be invented. A lot of the reason for our efforts in 
> Squeak is to help provide a vehicle that will help all of us make 
> progress by giving us a way to bring new ideas to live and share them 
> out over the net.

I remember Andrew Lippman saying something about the power of the masses. 
If I remember correctly, he was saying that the Media Lab needed to 
abandon innovating the PC, because the Web already allows so many people 
to do that. Thus, the great PC inventions just by numbers would not come 
from a handful of researchers. His personal take on the future of the 
Media Lab was going after innovation in arenas that were less competitive, 
because of still being relatively exclusive. If he is right, it would be 
an argument for letting the masses innovate interfaces if you really want 
innovation. Since Squeak allows for innovating the interface (at least 
better than most anything else out there), Squeak could be the vehicle for 
that innovation.

> This is a great Bruner quote. Where is it from?

"Towards a Theory of Instruction" (p.89). You recommended it at Apple Hill.

>       This is partly why we keep the kids programming stuff looking 
> like language. The idea is that, even though a 10 year olds' main 
> payoff may be to draw and drive the car (Doing and Images), our 
> "Montessori game" is to entice them into doing the dynamic parts 
> using symbolic language, because that is where the big powers 
> ultimately reside. Etc. Etc.

I'm not sure that's what you actually meant. A 10 year olds' main payoff 
is not only drawing and driving the car. I would argue that the main 
payoff is the accomplishment that comes with doing something new (making a 
script to control a drawing) and creating an artifact (a fairly functional 
car). Drawing the car on a computer is probably not too exciting, nor does 
the scripted car compare with modern video games. But, yes, the symbolic 
is extremely powerful.

Peace and Luck!

Je77





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