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0 pointspodperson15y ago0 comments

I think the problem wasn't Microsoft entering the market too early so much as never really rethinking their approach to a platform. Their idea for PDAs/phones was a tiny version of desktop windows (compare that to Apple's Newton, with all its flaws). Their idea for tablets was a pen based version of desktop windows.

Microsoft has NEVER really originated a UI paradigm or OS, they just copied/bought/stole stuff from other people, and generally did it badly. (No question they sometimes contribute refinements.)

We're just lucky they didn't try to put a tiny version of DOS on PDAs and a pen driven version of DOS on tablets.

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7 comments · 2 top-level

whatusername15y ago· 5 in thread

Aside from Xerox, what large company has originated a UI paradigm or OS? Apple bought the multi-touch stuff, MS licenses Kinect, etc, etc.

Nintondo maybe with the Wii?

philwelch15y ago

Apple bought the multi-touch stuff

I didn't know that they bought or licensed the entire UI paradigm from someone else. Or do you just mean the low level parts? Because there's more to a UI paradigm than the input device. So, if it's just the screen tech that Apple bought and not the interaction software, I would count multi-touch as an Apple-originated UI paradigm, just as you credit the desktop GUI to Xerox, not Stanford Research Institute where Engelbart invented the mouse.

Also, the iPod scroll wheel is an Apple-originated UI paradigm.

seabee15y ago

Well count yourself wrong: http://www.amazon.com/Fingerworks-IGESTURENUMPAD-iGesture-Pa...

That thing even let you switch between apps with gestures.

The iPod scroll wheel isn't an Apple paradigm either; jog dials for menu selection existed years before the iPod. I remember seeing it on the minidisc recorder in our school's music department.

3 more replies

rahoulb15y ago

Disagree. Apple paid Xerox for the GUI (in shares) but then added a number of elements we consider an integral part of the GUI.

Xerox had overlapping windows, a mouse, networking and Smalltalk.

Apple lost the network and Smalltalk (later to reappear as Appletalk and Obj-C) but added icons, pull-down menus and the desktop metaphor.

podpersonOP15y ago

Xerox didn't "invent" the GUI any more than Apple did. (Xerox got its ideas from Englebart et al.) Apple's desktop UI was "original" insofar as anything is. Windows (and for that matter NeXT) pointedly was not. Similarly Newton had a complete and "original" UI. Then there's iOS.

Apple's track record here is pretty darn good.

jacabado15y ago

Nokia S60?

Blackberry for mobile texting?

We're past them now but we still see lots of bad UIs that could learn with their success. I'm thinking about the heterogeneous button layouts on Android and previous generation Windows Mobile devices.

wazoox15y ago

> We're just lucky they didn't try to put a tiny version of DOS on PDAs and a pen driven version of DOS on tablets.

There were a number of pocket-size DOS computers, like the Atari Portfolio.

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