Instead of 'applications', you have objects you can manipulate (compose, decompose, rearrange, etc.) in a common environment. The state of the system, the construction of the objects, determines not only how they appear but how they behave - i.e. how they influence and observe the world. Task management is then simply rearranging objects: if you want to turn an object 'off', you 'disconnect' part of the graph, or perhaps you flip a switch that does the same thing under the hood.
This has very physical analogies. For example, there are at least two ways to "task manage" a light: you could disconnect your lightbulb from its socket, or you could flip a lightswitch, which opens a circuit. There are a few interesting classes of objects, which might be described as 'tools'. There are tools for your hand, like different paintbrushes in Paint Shop. There are also tools for your eyes/senses, like a magnifying glass, x-ray goggles, heads-up display, events notification, or language translation. And there are tools that touch both aspects - like a projectional editor, lenses. If we extend the user-model with concepts like 'inventory', and programmable tools for both hand and eye, those can serve as another form of task management. When you're done painting, put down the paintbrush. This isn't really the same as switching between tasks. I.e. you can still get event notifications on your heads-up-display while you're editing an image. It's closer to controlling your computational environment by direct manipulation of structure that is interpreted as code (aka live programming). Best, Dave On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 10:29 AM, Casey Ransberger <[email protected] > wrote: > A fun, but maybe idealistic idea: an "application" of a computer should > just be what one decides to do with it at the time. > > I've been wondering how I might best switch between "tasks" (or really > things that aren't tasks too, like toys and documentaries and symphonies) > in a world that does away with most of the application level modality that > we got with the first Mac. > > The dominant way of doing this with apps usually looks like either the OS > X dock or the Windows 95 taskbar. But if I wanted less shrink wrap and more > interoperability between the virtual things I'm interacting with on a > computer, without forcing me to "multitask" (read: do more than one thing > at once very badly,) what's my best possible interaction language look like? > > I would love to know if these tools came from some interesting research > once upon a time. I'd be grateful for any references that can be shared. > I'm also interested in hearing any wild ideas that folks might have, or > great ideas that fell by the wayside way back when. > > Out of curiosity, how does one change one's "mood" when interacting with > Frank? > > Casey > _______________________________________________ > fonc mailing list > [email protected] > http://vpri.org/mailman/listinfo/fonc >
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