• Steve Jobs unveiled the NeXT Computer on this day in 1988

    From Lawrence =?iso-8859-13?q?D=FFOliveiro?=@ldo@nz.invalid to alt.folklore.computers on Mon Oct 13 00:36:51 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.folklore.computers

    Article <https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/steve-jobs-unveiled-the-next-computer-on-this-day-in-1988-the-cube-would-be-used-to-develop-the-www-doom-and-quake>
    looking back at the introduction of the first product from NeXT, Inc,
    the company Steve Jobs founded after being ousted from Apple.

    This was probably the highest-profile attempt at the time to come up
    with a rCLuser-friendly UnixrCY. I remember it being touted as a virtue
    that it was very difficult to actually get to the command line, as
    proof that you didnrCOt need one. Or even to tell that it was a rCLUnixrCY system.

    GUI programming was becoming popular, while the languages and APIs for
    doing it were still hard to use. NeXTStep had the rCLInterface BuilderrCY, which allowed drag-and-drop creation of UI layouts, that was the envy
    of other platforms.

    There were some clever things about this machine, some not so clever.
    That 256MiB magneto-optical drive was a big step up from floppy disks,
    but the media was expensive. The idea that third-party apps might be distributed on such disks was simply not practical.

    The inclusion of a DSP for audio and other processing was another groundbreaking feature, that was innovative for a while until the
    power of RISC CPUs made such special-purpose signal-processing
    hardware obsolete.

    Display PostScript sounded amazing, since PostScript was already
    legendary for the print quality it made possible. It took some years
    to realize that the PostScript graphics model was really only suited
    for making marks on paper, not for generating interactive displays on
    a screen.
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  • From Niklas Karlsson@nikke.karlsson@gmail.com to alt.folklore.computers on Mon Oct 13 05:42:59 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.folklore.computers

    On 2025-10-13, Lawrence DrCOOliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
    Article
    <https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/steve-jobs-unveiled-the-next-computer-on-this-day-in-1988-the-cube-would-be-used-to-develop-the-www-doom-and-quake>
    looking back at the introduction of the first product from NeXT, Inc,
    the company Steve Jobs founded after being ousted from Apple.

    This was probably the highest-profile attempt at the time to come up
    with a rCLuser-friendly UnixrCY. I remember it being touted as a virtue
    that it was very difficult to actually get to the command line, as
    proof that you didnrCOt need one. Or even to tell that it was a rCLUnixrCY system.

    Interesting. Present-day macOS is basically a successor to NeXTstep, and
    it's certainly not hard to get to the CLI there.

    Niklas
    --
    Butterscotch schnapps is a great memory restorative. Now I remember why I don't drink it more often.
    -- Stevo, asr
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