[Discuss] Lisa Emulator Released, interesting details of LOS

[Darren Duncan]

Now here's an interesting article, detailing part of the state of 
computing 24 years ago (1983):

http://lowendmac.com/hodges/07/0227.html

An emulator for Apple's Lisa computer, which came before the first 
Mac, has been released.

But particularly interesting is the description of what the Lisa 
Office System was like to use.  A few details:

   * The UI is a GUI, loosely resembling the original Mac OS in appearance.

   * The LOS was preemptively multitasked, which is ironic considering 
that the following Mac OS wasn't until X; so eg, you can hold a menu 
down and other tasks in the background keep going.

   * The LOS was document-oriented rather than application oriented.

   * The desktop contained template files for each type of document 
you could work on.  Rather than opening a program and creating a 
document, you first duplicated one of the templates by dragging and 
naming it, then you open it to work on it.

   * You don't quit applications since they are always open.

   * Documents automatically save, so you don't have to explicitly 
save, but if you do, then what you actually did was create a snapshot 
of the document's state, so you can then go back to an earlier 
version later if you want to.

   * The computer remembers what you were doing when you turn it off, 
saving everything before shutting down, and so when you turn it on 
later, all your same documents are open.

Anyway, read the article.

I found it quite enlightening how the Lisa was actually more modern 
and advanced in a number of ways than the original Mac OS that came 
just after it.

-- Darren Duncan