One of the key issues was that they started STEPS with the premise that they needed NSF funding for running the FONC project on super computers. This strategy i

One of the key issues was that they started STEPS with the premise that they needed NSF funding for running the FONC project on super computers. This strategy is to "time travel" 10 years into the future, like Alan Kay did at Parc to develop the Alto. In this last phase of the STEPS project, sub-systems like the graphics system were close to running fast enough on commodity hardware, that they changed course during this last phase, abandoning time sloted for design iterations and exploration, to focus on optimization instead.