The first personal computers with graphical capabilities were Xerox Star (1982) and the Apple Macintosh (1984). They were revolutionary, in the way that they were computers meant for one individual, more graphical visual, and easier to use. When comparing the user interface and features of the personal computer from then to the ones used today, there are many similarities, differences, and ways they can expand in the future.
Expanding on the similarities between the Star and the Macintosh, there is some interface resemblance to what we have today. For example, the use of a “desk top” with the use of icons to represent objects usually found at the office, such as paper, folders, filing cabinets, trash can, etc. Other similarities found are windows, menubar, tools, the difference between a selected file, and the mouse cursor. More feature-like similarities I observed were the ability to drag, move, and organize files, copy and paste to the clipboard, paragraph styles and styles for text, the ability to send documents globally, etc.
The differences between the PC’s of before to the ones now are quite clear. Even though their screens were graphic, they are no match to the graphical capabilities of today. Theirs are black and white with noticeable pixels, while today we have colored displays, such as Retinas and OLED that have high color range and pixels that are not apparent to the human eyes. We have more sophisticated hierarchical ways of managing files, sharing information with others without the direct connection to servers, creating files without having to duplicate existing ones, etc.
Keeping the similarities and differences in mind over the years gives us a great idea of what things have been successful over the years and which have not. This helps us infer what the next generations of user interfaces will be like in the future. I believe that desktop and doc will remain the same since they provide quick shortcuts to your most important/used programs and files; although the multi-window management will improve since it is difficult to manage multiple opened programs all at once. The menu bar. I also believe programs will get much simpler and less local storage based. We already see the use of websites for apps in Windows, Android, and Chromebooks. These changes will help the personal computer expand to help improve the productivity of humans and computers.
some of your points are interesting to discuss, like desktop and doc will remain the same, multi-window management will improve. but I think that some novel developments also must based on the improvement of hardware
“I believe that desktop and doc will remain the same since they provide quick shortcuts to your most important/used programs and files”. I like you are very confident! But what do you think about the development of AR and VR? would it replace the paradigm of computing age?