March 92 - Introduction to PenPoint
Introduction to PenPoint
John Brugge
There's a new operating system in town, and it aims to change the way people think
about computers as much as the Macintosh has.
When GO Corporation's PenPoint was announced last year, it received as much
attention from the business community as it did from the software community. The
mouse was being joined, if not challenged, by the pen as the device for the masses.
Those who remembered the introduction of the Macintosh proclaimed a new revolution
was about to begin.
Undoubtedly it has. With a handful of players, including Microsoft, jockeying for
position as king of the pen-based world, pen-based computing is not being regarded as
a fad, but rather as the next logical step in the evolution of computers-making them
more personal, more familiar, and less visible.
For the programming community, pen-based applications present a fascinating new
frontier to explore, and no environment is as interesting to explore that frontier
within as PenPoint. For application designers, it provides a whole new set of ground
rules to define "application." For programmers new to the object-oriented world, it
provides a learning arena where you have to be object-oriented. For MacApp
programmers, it provides some lessons on what the future of software development
may hold.
Feet on the ground
While the entire field of pen-based computing is fascinating to many for reasons
ranging from the sociological to the metaphysical, I'll try to stay closer to earth in
this article. Even there, the most that I can hope to do in these few pages is introduce
you to some ideas that will make you question ideas that seemed basic, and perhaps
make you curious to explore more on your own.
A number of good articles in the trade publications have covered the idea of pen-based
computing and the major players involved. See Byte, Feb. '91, MacUser, Feb. '92, or
MacUser, Mar. '91 for starters. For those interested in learning more about the full
scope of PenPoint, I recommend the book "The Power of PenPoint" by Robert Carr, the
architect of PenPoint, and Dan Shafer (Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-57763-1). It
covers the high points of the operating system and the important classes involved in
far fewer pages than the voluminous technical documentation that comes with the
software developer's kit.
I will not be talking about Microsoft Windows for Pen Computing. Windows for Pens
will no doubt be an economic force in the market, but Microsoft is a follower in this
field, and the vision of mobile, pen-based computing will be lead by companies like GO.
With that said, I will set some minimal PenPoint background.
PenPoint Application Characteristics
While parallels can be drawn between PenPoint and other windowing interfaces, it's
best to approach the concept of "application" with a clear mind. GO chose the notebook
as its metaphor for the user's workspace, giving the user a much different set of
expectations when interacting with the machine. Key to the metaphor of the notebook