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As I said, he was really great to work with. He wrote the initial draft of the simple frame language that bauhaus used for "intelligent assistance". He was a ca

As I said, he was really great to work with. He wrote the initial draft of the simple frame language that bauhaus used for "intelligent assistance". He was a capable Lisp hacker, and a big fan of Lisp and Smalltalk. He's also just one of the nicest people I've ever met. He left Apple some time around when Steve Jobs returned. I don't know why why he left, but I wouldn't be surprised if Steve had something to do with it. I worked for Steve at NeXT for a little while, and he came and sat in my office one day and went on at length about everything that was wrong with Apple in his view. Prominent on his list were the Advanced Technology Group and the Human Interface Group. Larry was involved one way or another with both of those institutions, and Steve wasted no time getting rid of them when he took over again.

lispm 7y ago
From me being far away: ATG was one of the things which made Apple cool.
- mikelevins 7y ago
  I agree; it was. I think firing the Human Interface Group was a mistake, too. I think the usability of Apple's products has suffered, and so has the usability of technology products in general.
  - lispm 7y ago
    How do you feel about it? I had a bunch of Newton MessagePad and the 2100 model was especially great. The MessagePad UI was not in color and was less animated than something like the early released iPhone or iPad. Okay, probably hardware limitations of the time: screen price, lower power draw, less powerful graphics processing, ... I always found the UI model of the iPhone (and iPad) limited to what the Newton MessagePad did. It is still boring in the main OS screens. Was it to reach mass market? was it a conscious choice? or was it the non-dynamic programming system introduced with the iPhone, which limits the experience?
    - mikelevins 7y ago
      I liked the Newton products, and used them for a while. I thought the MessagePad was an awkward size, though; too big to fit in a pocket, but too small to have a good-sized screen. It would have been better if it were either smaller, like the Palm Pilot, or larger, like the unreleased Senior and Cadillac prototypes (I had a couple of those and liked them quite a bit). Hardware limitations did have an important effect on them. Pretty much everything you see on the shipping Newton was a compromise between trying to give the device enough power and capacity to be interesting and trying to keep it small and cheap enough for people to buy. We didn't hit the sweet spot. Yeah, iOS gave up a lot of flexibility and capability as compared to Newton, but Steve was never going to reuse a failed product conceived under someone else's leadership, and anyway, he chose to abandon the whole idea of a device for creating stuff and went with a device for consuming.

lispm 7y ago

From me being far away: ATG was one of the things which made Apple cool.

mikelevins 7y ago
I agree; it was. I think firing the Human Interface Group was a mistake, too. I think the usability of Apple's products has suffered, and so has the usability of technology products in general.
- lispm 7y ago
  How do you feel about it? I had a bunch of Newton MessagePad and the 2100 model was especially great. The MessagePad UI was not in color and was less animated than something like the early released iPhone or iPad. Okay, probably hardware limitations of the time: screen price, lower power draw, less powerful graphics processing, ... I always found the UI model of the iPhone (and iPad) limited to what the Newton MessagePad did. It is still boring in the main OS screens. Was it to reach mass market? was it a conscious choice? or was it the non-dynamic programming system introduced with the iPhone, which limits the experience?
  - mikelevins 7y ago
    I liked the Newton products, and used them for a while. I thought the MessagePad was an awkward size, though; too big to fit in a pocket, but too small to have a good-sized screen. It would have been better if it were either smaller, like the Palm Pilot, or larger, like the unreleased Senior and Cadillac prototypes (I had a couple of those and liked them quite a bit). Hardware limitations did have an important effect on them. Pretty much everything you see on the shipping Newton was a compromise between trying to give the device enough power and capacity to be interesting and trying to keep it small and cheap enough for people to buy. We didn't hit the sweet spot. Yeah, iOS gave up a lot of flexibility and capability as compared to Newton, but Steve was never going to reuse a failed product conceived under someone else's leadership, and anyway, he chose to abandon the whole idea of a device for creating stuff and went with a device for consuming.