4 ms·
I've read "The Dream Machine" by M. Mitchell Waldrop. Excellent and very pleasant read. Can anyone recommend other books about PARC? I'm particularly interested
by liendolucas 4y ago
I've read "The Dream Machine" by M. Mitchell Waldrop. Excellent and very pleasant read. Can anyone recommend other books about PARC? I'm particularly interested in the Alto computer, its development, technical details and so on. What happened with the Alto development is both fantastic and a tragedy and I guess that's why I'm so keen to read more about it.
Edit: Also while not strictly on a regular computer, I highly recommend: "Digital Apollo Human and Machine in Spaceflight" by David A. Mindell which tells the story of the Apollo's computer development.
- neversaydie 4y agoYeah, just finished that one (Dream Machine) myself, excellent book. The other main one I know of is Dealers of Lightning, which centres on PARC specifically. Also quite a good book. Another is Fumbling the Future, which discuss the apparent failure of Xerox to capitalise on their computing research (as you'll know from having read the Dream Machine, the reality is a bit more nuanced than that). Haven't read this one myself, not sure how good it is, seems well-received though. Finally, Alan Kay is quite active on Quora these days, and often talks about PARC-related material: https://www.quora.com/profile/Alan-Kay-11 https://www.quora.com/profile/Alan-Kay-11 (At some point I recall him mentioning the Dream Machine being one of the best accounts of PARC's history, btw.)
- EvanAnderson 4y agoIf you didn’t see this recent thread, check it out: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34987658 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34987658