Current Technology Wouldn’t Surprise Computer Pioneers

Q. I’ve often wished that I could travel back in time with one of today’s computers just to see the look on the face of a computer pioneer as he sees my amazing machine.

If someone from 1995 had time traveled back 20 years to you in your early Microsoft days, with a modern laptop under his arm, what would your reaction have been? -Steve Davenport

A. I would have been astonished at the time travel and keenly interested in the laptop. Who wouldn’t be intrigued by something from the future?

On the other hand I don’t think many pioneers of microcomputing would have been shocked that powerful laptop computers would emerge by the 1990s. Nothing terribly surprising has happened.

Today’s laptops are fairly straightforward refinements of technology that, for the most part, was apparent two decades ago.

Computers have gotten faster, memory more capacious and physical sizes smaller. This is all scaling phenomenon. There’s no true breakthrough here.

Computers are much easier to use now, in part because of Xerox’s invention of the graphical user interface. But displaying graphics on a screen was an obvious idea, too.

For several years, personal computers didn’t have power to display graphics effectively so the industry made do with a “hack” - a quick-and-dirty shortcut. The hack was to display nothing but characters on the screen, thereby reducing the need for processing speed and computer memory. It was a good hack, but it was necessary only while computers were underpowered.

Today’s computers are much more powerful but not in a way that would surprise the pioneers of computing, many of whom could see way down the road.

As long ago as 1968, Alan Kaye wrote about his vision of a so-called “DynaBook” - essentially a laptop computer.

Fifty years ago, a founder of the National Science Foundation, Vannevar Bush, wrote about his vision of a machine for browsing and recalling vast amounts of information. He called it a “memex.”

“Professionally our methods of transmitting and reviewing the results of research are generations old and by now are totally inadequate for their purpose …,” Bush wrote in the July, 1945, issue of The Atlantic Monthly magazine. “A memex is a device in which an individual stores all his books, records and communications, and which is mechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility,” he wrote. “It is an enlarged intimate supplement to his memory.”

Bush got the details of the technology wrong. He foresaw the memex as a desk with a built-in screen for displaying and recording microfilm. But he got a lot of concepts, such as hypertext and other forms of automated indexing, exactly right.

“There is, of course, provision for consultation of the record by the usual scheme of indexing,” Bush wrote. “If the user wishes to consult a certain book, he taps its code on the keyboard and the title page of the book promptly appears before him, projected onto one of his viewing positions.”

Bush died in 1974. Would he have been shocked by today’s laptops? I don’t think so.

Q. When will you write a book? -Bill Standwill, New York; Rod Aquino, Australia; Thye Tark Soon, Malaysia; Sergei Prokhorov, Russia, and others.

A. I already have. Its English title is “The Road Ahead,” and it is being published now by Viking in the United States, Penguin in Great Britain and a variety of other publishers in other countries.

The book describes my vision of the future and my reasons for optimism. I wrote it to express enthusiasm for what’s gone on so far in the area of information technology and my view that it’s only a small part of what’s possible.

Nobody really knows exactly where technology is taking us, but there are things the past teaches us - and I have some pretty strong hunches about the future.

I tried to make “The Road Ahead” a book that everyone, not just computer enthusiasts, would follow easily. It is vital that all segments of society understand and participate in the discussion about our collective future.

For example, education is a realm where information technology is destined to have an enormous impact. We should all be talking about this. A lot of money is needed to train teachers and get the right equipment and connections, which is why I chose educational charities to receive my proceeds from the book.

Originally I gave myself three or four months to write the book. That was before I knew how much work it would be. At the end of that period, my co-authors and I pretty much threw out everything we had done and started over again in a less-rushed frame of mind.

My admiration for people who write books has increased now that I’ve done one. Writing a non-fiction book forces you to really think issues through in a disciplined way. It challenges you to order your thoughts. You find hidden gaps and inconsistencies, which prompts still more thought.

People sometimes ask why I wrote a book. This may seem amusing, but one reason was so that certain friends could understand what I foresee. I never seem to get the time to explain all that I want to. Now I can just give them “The Road Ahead.”

But the real reason was to get certain ideas out for examination, to help elevate the debate. When I talk to a journalist or give a speech I will build on the platform erected by the book rather than repeating the same message over and over to different audiences.

Q. What are you crazy about? -Naohiro Hamada, Japan

A. Artificial intelligence. Great graphics. Software authoring tools that let people build cool things. Working with smart people. Outside the office, I get excited about books. And I always go to the movies.

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