Day: July 12, 2006
The Xerox Alto
I always knew that Xerox was the first to come up with a GUI but this is the first time I’ve actually seen it.
The Xerox Alto was designed to be a relatively small, yet powerful, personal office computer with the ability to present information graphically, and to easily share information. They were also designed to utilize laser printers that were also under development at Xerox.
The first Alto was completed in 1973. The hardware of the Alto machines consisted of:
- A 606*808 tall monochrome bit-mapped video display.
- A 3-button mouse.
- Optional 5-key chord key set.
- Large 2.5 megabyte removable disks.
- 16-bit microcode programmable CPU custom-built from TTL chips.
- A total address space of 64 K 16-bit words (128k bytes), including the graphics bitmap.
- Using memory bank selection, a total of 256 K words (512K bytes) was possible.
The Canary Project
To compile a persuasive body of images, we will be photographing at least 16 landscapes throughout the world. These images will show that global warming: (1) is affecting the world in a variety of ways (melting, sea-level rise, drought, extreme weather events, dying habitats, etc.); (2) is affecting every place on earth.
Famous Kids and Teens
A gallery of celebs when they were young. Pictured above is Angelina Jolie.
BBC Lip Readers on What Was Said to Zidane
Photograph of Mozart’s Widow
The Museum of Hoaxes thinks the picture of Mozart’s widow that has been going around the net for the past week is a hoax.
Anglo-Zanzibar War
Wikipedia’s entry on the shortest war:
The war broke out after Sultan Hamad bin Thuwaini, who had willingly co-operated with the British colonial administration, died on 25 August 1896, and his nephew, Khalid bin Bargash, seized power in what amounted to a coup d’état. The British favoured another candidate, Hamud bin Muhammed, whom they believed it would be easier to work with, and delivered an ultimatum ordering Bargash to abdicate.
(Thanks Jack)