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Major Update!!!

As you can probably tell, we've been very busy here at Psi-Scape Labs in the last few weeks!  The most obvious change is probably the complete website overhaul.  I believe that this design is much more sleek and pleasing to the eye.  Second change, as you will notice in the link section above, is the "PODCAST" link.  I'm excited to announce that I am in the final stages of setting up the equipment and services to produce a weekly podcast. The topic of the podcast will be the current latest and greatest in Computer Human Interaction; including input devices, User Interface innovation, OS news, and of course... the much anticipated Xerox Parc Smalltalk/Alto Disk images!  Each week, I will be posting 3 disk images taken directly from Alto Computes at Xerox Parc imaged between the years 1975 and 1978.  These images haven't seen the light of day in 30 years, so each image can be looked at as a time capsule and will allow us to look in on the happenings at parc at that time and together we will see the very first emails ever sent, the first word processors, the code behind the first GUI's, etc.  It certainly is exciting and I'm glad I can share this with everyone.
Also most episodes of the podcast will feature a special guest.  One of the first guests tentatively slated to appear on a future podcast is none other than the father of the arpanet and mouse, (among other things) Doug Engelbart!  
Special thanks goes out to Michael Rueger of impara.de for hosting the the Xerox Parc Time-Capsule and also special thanks to Alan Doucette of StyledContent.com for hosting the main website.

Design Principles

One of my favorite quotes of all time was from Daniel Ingalls, one of the original creators of the Xerox Alto's implementation of the Smalltalk programming language/user interface.  He stated:

Operating System:  An operating system is a collection of things that don't fit into a language.  There shouldn't be one.

This is probably one of the most misunderstood principles from the 1981 Byte magazine article on "Design Principles Behind Smalltalk."   As a UNIX user myself (several flavors despite the apple logo at the bottom of the page), it would seem almost as a contradiction of principle, considering the structure of SVR4, Mach (XNU), Hurd, and Linux Kernels. 

But consider that this statement was about something extraordinary:  The Smalltalk programming environment.  A programming language, an OS, a IDE, and complete GUI, rolled into one self contained system (entirely comprehensible to a single individual). 

So the purpose of this website will be to explore the future ideas of computer human interaction on my Blog, to examine the past through my personal archives of Smalltalk and the Xerox Parc projects of the early to late 1970's, and to let people know about me and my interests on my About Me page.

Programming Languages

1. Squeak
2. GNU Smalltalk
3. Sun microsystems' SELF Language

Currently there are several commercial Smalltalk versions (most derived from the original Xerox Smalltalk-80 Version 2).  There also exists several GNU, OpenSource, and CDDL versions of Smalltalk, and Smalltalk like systems.  These three are probably the most commonly used free versions of Smalltalk. 
Self, technically isn't smalltalk.  It is a programming system that probably conforms to the vision of "Design Principles Behind Smalltalk" better than even Smalltalk conforms to the principles, and I am VERY surprised that more interest hasn't been taken in it.  Several  of Sun's most prominent technologies emerged out of it though... The JAVA virtual machine, being a big one.