🚀 go-pugleaf

>From Joe.Newcomer@CMU-10A Thu Jul 16 07:55:36 1981
You've fallen into the same trap that most people do.  If what you
want is the ability to scan quickly thru a document, this suggests
that a capability the computer should have is to scan quickly thru a
document.  If you want to make notes, the computer should provide the
ability to make notes.  If you want to doodle in color, the computer
should provide the ability to doodle in color.  What you've stated is
not reasons for retaining paper, but a specification of what
capabilities we need in a computer if we want paper to go away.

Now current technology makes a lot of this extremely difficult.  For
example, at very slow data rates (say, 9600, which is as close to DC
as one would care to get), it is unreasonable to browse thru most
large documents.  With 24-line screens, finding enough context to
make sense of what has been typed is nearly impossible.  But saying
that online retrieval will never replace paper is silly; it means
you've failed to adapt the computer to what people need.

The observation that it is useful to print things out on paper so
they don't have to be stored online is likewise looking at the
problem from the wrong side.  What I want is a method of taking silly
pieces of paper and getting them onto the machine so I don't need to
store the paper!  Fact: secondary storage is cheap, is getting
cheaper, and even primitive archiving techniques make it look even
cheaper.  Why should I have to do something (file a piece of paper)
that the computer can do more effectively?

I keep all my source listings in hardcopy form.  Why? Because it is
faster to look something up on hardcopy than online.  Why?  because a
24x80, 9600 baud terminal is too small and too slow to accomodate me.
If I had four or five 60-line screens with a typical effective
bandwidth (including disk latency, etc.) of about 100Kbaud, I
wouldn't need to print anything.  One way of achieving this is to use
multiple windows, but it is not the only way (another is to have four
or five 60-line terminals).

If paper is more effective, then there is a mismatch between the
needs of the person and the software.  I don't see anything which has
yet made that statement even suspect.  What we need to do is explore
how to eliminate that mismatch.
				joe