Newsgroups: comp.sys.xerox
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!bb3.andrew.cmu.edu!newsfeed.pitt.edu!scramble.lm.com!news.math.psu.edu!chi-news.cic.net!news.sba.com!pacifier!news.ac.net!imci4!newsfeed.internetmci.com!swrinde!howland.reston.ans.net!math.ohio-state.edu!uwm.edu!lll-winken.llnl.gov!parc!rocksanne!news
From: chris@xerox.com (Chris Heiny)
Subject: Re: xerox star
Message-ID: <1996Mar22.150736.26635@news.wrc.xerox.com>
Sender: news@news.wrc.xerox.com
Reply-To: chris@xerox.com
Organization: Xerox Corporation, Webster NY
References: <4injv1$68q@newsbf02.news.aol.com>
Date: Fri, 22 Mar 1996 15:07:36 GMT
Lines: 34


In article <4injv1$68q@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, glblcompco@aol.com (Glblcompco) writes:
>cm5334@ccub.wlv.ac.uk (Steve Taylor) writes
>>Can  anyone give me any information on the Xerox Star  system?  I
>>beleive  it  was the first windows system ever developed  but  it
>>didn't sell well and consequently flopped. I think it was  called
>>the  Xerox  Star  but the important thing is it's  history  as  a
>>system etc.
>
>I think you'll find the first window system was developed on the Xerox
>Alto almost 10 years before the STAR, probably by the smalltalk folks. The
>Alto was the grandfather? of the STAR, with the Dorado as the parent?  The
>BCPL version of the Alto had split screens, I not sure if it had *windows*
>or exactly how you would define them. What type of information are you
>looking for? There are tons of papers on the history - you can get a very
>cursory history from www.xerox.com

The Mesa programming language development environment on the Alto had
a very modern windowing model - windows were overlappable, iconifiable,
and even had a third (very useful) state called "inactive", where the
icon was not visible but the code was still loaded and ready to go.

This environment was the direct predecessor to the Mesa Development
Environment (MDE) on the Star/8000/6085 serie (MDE later became
the Xerox Development Environment in a belated and undersupported
effort to place it as a commercial product),  XDE in turn heavily
influenced SunTools and (less heavily) OpenWindows.

One can only wonder what the computing world would be like if
Xerox had adopted a more agressive and open approach to marketing
MDE in 1982...

						Chris 

