Dealers of Lightning : Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age

while Gates, Jobs, And The Other Big Boys Of Silicon Valley Are Basking In The Glory Of The Information Age, Renowned los Angeles Times Reporter Hiltzik Reveals How, Back In The Early '70s, A Group Of Little-known Inventors At Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (parc) Blazed The Trail For All Of Today's Indispensable Technology — From The Pc To Email To Atms To Meteorologists' Weather Maps. And They Did It Without Fanfare Or Recognition From Their Employer. This Fascinating Look At Techno-history Sets The Record Straight. electronic Review Of Books - Michael Swaine the Founder Of Federal Express Got A C On The College Paper He Wrote Describing The Idea For His Company. Fedex And Its Competitors Are Doing Pretty Well Now. although I Don't Agree With Hiltzig That The Alto Was The World's First Personal Computer, That's Just A Matter Of Different Definitions -- His Strictly Technological, Mine Involving Price And Marketing As Well. I Have A Few Other Quibbles With The Book, But, Overall, I Found It Highly Readable And Seemingly Authoritative. In Writing The Book, Hiltzig Drew On The Recollections Of Those Who Were There, Interviewing All The Obvious Suspects And Not A Few Innocent Bystanders. the Book Is Worth Reading Just To Remind Yourself Of The Amazing Invention Machine Parc Was -- And Of The Amazing Collection Of Inventors Who Were There. the Development Of The Alto, Of Course, But Also: jim Clark (the Cofounder Of Netscape) Designing The Geometry Engine As Part Of A Parc-supervised Course At Stanford And Launching Silicon Graphics On The Strength Of It. lynn Conway (of Mead And Conway, The Most Well-known Names In Vlsi) Developing The Design Techniques And Tools To Make Vlsi A Practical Reality. an Offhand Remark To Gary Starkweather Leading To The Invention Of The Laser Printer. bob Metcalfe Sifting Through Various Networking Options And Coming Up With Ethernet. alan Kay Telling Dan Ingalls And Ted Kaehler That The Most Powerful Programming Language In The World Could Be Specified In One Page And, When Challenged To Put Up Or Shut Up, Inventing Smalltalk. bob Taylor Recruiting Bill English Away From Doug Engelbart And Getting Access To The Mouse And All The Other Goodies Of Engelbart's Lab. charles Simonyi Inventing Wysiwyg. dan Ingalls Shocking The Crowd When He Demonstrated Bitblt. john Warnock And Chuck Jeschke Creating Page-description Languages. alvy Ray Smith Coming Up With The Hsv Transformation. hiltzig Describes Parc's Origins, The Recruitment Of Talent, Its Culture, People, Politics, And Projects. He Also Spends A Chapter On The Question, Did Xerox Blow It? That Strikes Me As Overkill For A Question That Can Be Answered In A Word -- Duh! but I Don't Mean To Belittle Hiltzig's Analysis Of The Politics Of Parc. He Does An Impressive Job Of Telling Not Only What Happened, But Why And How It Happened, And How Xerox Management Both Hindered And Empowered This Amazing Band Of Inventors. if This Is Failure, We Should All Be So Unsuccessful. __Dealers of Lightning__ __Los Angeles Times,__ Based on extensive interviews with the scientists, engineers, administrators, and corporate executives who lived the story, __Dealers of Lightning__ takes the read on a journey from PARC's beginnings in a dusty, abandoned building at the edge of the Stanford University campus to its triumph as a hothouse of ideas that spawned not only the first personal computer, but the windows-style graphical user interface, the laser printer, much of the indispensable technology of the Internet, and a great deal more. It shows how and why Xerox, despite its willingness to grant PARC unlimited funding and the responsibility for developing breakthroughs to keep the corporation on the cutting edge of office technology, remained forever unable to grasp (and, consequently, exploit) the innovations that PARC delivered--and it details the increasing frustration of the original PARC scientists, many of whom would go on to build their fortunes upon the very ideas Xerox so rashly discarded. More than just a riveting historical narrative, __Dealers of Lightning__ brings to life an unforgettable cast of characters. Among them: Bob Taylor--the preacher's son from rural Texas who would be considered a prophet by some and a cantankerous egomaniac by others, whose fearless (and feared) leadership of a team of computer renegades made them the heroes of the embryonic Silicon Valley; Jack Goldman--the Xerox chief scientist who convinced the stolid corporation to stake tens of millions of dollars on PARC while warning that the investment might not pay off for years--if it paid off at all; Alan Kay--PARC's creative and philosophical soul, who suffered years of ridicule for envisioning a computer that could be tucked under the arm yet would contain the power to store books, symphonies, letters, poems, and drawings--until he arrived at Palo Alto and met the people who would build it; and Steve Jobs--who, aided by Xerox's indifference to PARC's most momentous inventions, staged a daring raid to obtain the technology that would end up at the heart of the Macintosh: the machine that for a time helped Apple dominate an explosive new market. __Dealers of Lightning__ is an unprecedented look at the ideas, the inventions, and the individuals that propelled Xerox PARC to the frontier of technohistory--and the corporate machinations that almost prevented it from achieving greatness. The Barnes & Noble Review March 1999 While Gates, Jobs, and the other big boys of Silicon Valley are basking in the glory of the information age, renowned Los Angeles Times reporter Michael Hiltzik reveals how, back in the early '70s, a group of inventors at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) blazed the trail for all of today's indispensable technology from the PC to email to ATMs to meteorologists' weather maps. And they did it without fanfare or recognition from their employer. Hiltzik's Dealers of Lightning provides a fascinating look at technohistory that sets the record straight. In Dealers of Lightning, Hiltzik describes the forces and faces behind the revolution that the Xerox PARC team single-handedly spawned. The Xerox PARC group was composed solely of top technical minds. The decision was made at Xerox headquarters to give the team complete freedom from deadlines and directives, in hopes of fostering a true creative environment. It worked perhaps too well. The team responded with a steady output of amazing technology, including the first version of the Internet, the first personal computer, user-friendly word-processing programs, and pop-up menus. Xerox, far from ready for the explosion of innovation, failed to utilize the technology dreamed up by the group. Out of all the dazzling inventions born at Xerox PARC, only a handful were developed and marketed by Xerox. However, one of these inventions, the laser printer, proved successful enough to earn billions for the company, therefore justifying its investment in the research center. Most oftheteam's creations would go on to be developed and perfected by other companies, such as IBM, Apple, and Microsoft. Drawing from interviews with the engineers, executives, and scientists involved in the Xerox PARC, Dealers of Lightning chronicles an amazing era of egos, ideas, and inventions at the dawn of the computer age. In the bestselling tradition of The Soul of a New Machine, Dealers of Lightning is a fascinating journey of intellectual creation. In the 1970s and '80s, Xerox Corporation brought together a brain-trust of engineering geniuses, a group of computer eccentrics dubbed PARC. This brilliant group created several monumental innovations that triggered a technological revolution, including the first personal computer, the laser printer, and the graphical interface (one of the main precursors of the Internet), only to see these breakthroughs rejected by the corporation. Yet, instead of giving up, these determined inventors turned their ideas into empires that radically altered contemporary life and changed the world.\\Based on extensive interviews with the scientists, engineers, administrators, and executives who lived the story, this riveting chronicle details PARC's humble beginnings through its triumph as a hothouse for ideas, and shows why Xerox was never able to grasp, and ultimately exploit, the cutting-edge innovations PARC delivered. Dealers of Lightning offers an unprecedented look at the ideas, the inventions, and the individuals that propelled Xerox PARC to the frontier of technohistoiy--and the corporate machinations that almost prevented it from achieving greatness In the bestselling tradition of The Soul of a New Machine, Dealers of Lightning is a fascinating journey of intellectual creation. In the 1970s and '80s, Xerox Corporation brought together a brain-trust of engineering geniuses, a group of computer eccentrics dubbed PARC. This brilliant group created several monumental innovations that triggered a technological revolution, including the first personal computer, the laser printer, and the graphical interface (one of the main precursors of the Internet), only to see these breakthroughs rejected by the corporation. Yet, instead of giving up, these determined inventors turned their ideas into empires that radically altered contemporary life and changed the world.Based on extensive interviews with the scientists, engineers, administrators, and executives who lived the story, this riveting chronicle details PARC's humble beginnings through its triumph as a hothouse for ideas, and shows why Xerox was never able to grasp, and ultimately exploit, the cutting-edge innovations PARC delivered. Dealers of Lightning offers an unprecedented look at the ideas, the inventions, and the individuals that propelled Xerox PARC to the frontier of technohistory--and the corporate machinations that almost prevented it from achieving greatness. The Pulitzer Prize-winner's classic account of the legendary research lab that gave rise to the Digital Age.In the 1970s and ‘80s, Xerox Corporation brought together a brain-trust of engineering geniuses dubbed PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). This brilliant group created several monumental innovations that triggered a technological revolution, including the first personal computer, the laser printer, and the graphical interface (one of the main precursors of the Internet). And when these breakthroughs were rejected by the corporation, these determined inventors turned their ideas into empires that changed the world.Based on extensive interviews with the scientists, engineers, administrators, and executives who lived the story, Dealers of Lightning details PARC's rise from humble beginnings to a hothouse for ideas. It also shows why Xerox was never able to grasp the cutting-edge innovations PARC delivered. Michael A. Hiltzik offers an unprecedented look at the ideas, the inventions, and the individuals that propelled Xerox PARC to the frontier of techno-history—and the corporate machinations that almost prevented it from achieving greatness. During a period of mind-blowing frenzy in the 1970s and '80s, a group of computer eccentrics thrown together by Xerox at a facility in Palo Alto, California, nicknamed PARC, created such monumental innovations as the first personal computer, the graphical user interface, and one of the main precursors to the Internet -- yet were resented by their Xerox bosses for "fooling around". Told that none of their inventions would ever amount to anything, many of the original PARC members went on to make millions on the very same ideas Xerox renounced. Focusing on this mythologized group whose genius propelled it to the cutting edge of technohistory, as well as the corporate machinations that kept it from achieving greatness, Dealers of Lightning offers an exclusive, inside glimpse of business history that marks the dawn of the computer age and provides a prism through which to view the 21st century During The 1970s And 1980s, A Number Of Brilliant Computer Eccentrics Were Thrown Together By Xerox At The Xerox Parc Centre In Palo Alto, California. These People Created Inventions Such As The First Personal Computer, The Graphic User Interface, The Mouse And One Of The Precursors Of The Internet. However, The Bosses At Xerox Never Really Appreciated These Men Or Their Innovations, And Accused Them Of Just Fooling Around. Then Along Came The Outsiders, Such As Steve Jobs Of Apple Computing, Who Left The Parc With Ideas That They Would Later Exploit And Make Vast Fortunes On, Propelling Them To The Cutting Edge Of Technology. This Book Offers A Glimpse Of Business And Technology. It Is A Story Of Missed Opportunities, But Also One That Marks The Dawn Of The Computer Age. The Story Of The Collection Of Eccentric Young Inventors Brought Together By Xerox Corporation, Of Their Hothouse Of Ideas Including A Windows-style Graphical User Interface And The Laser Printer, Of Why Xerox Discarded The Ideas, And Of The Individuals Involved: Bob Taylor, Jack Goldman, Alan Kay, And Steve Jobs.--jacket. Introduction: The Time Machine -- Pt. I. Prodigies. Ch. 1. The Impresario. Ch. 2. Mccolough's Folly. Ch. 3. The House On Porter Drive. Ch. 4. Utopia. Ch. 5. Berkeley's Second System. Ch. 6. Not Your Normal Person Ch. 7. The Clone. Ch. 8. The Future Invented -- Pt. Ii. Inventors. Ch. 9. The Refugee. Ch. 10. Beating The Dealer. Ch. 11. Spacewar. Michael Hiltzik. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 419-422) And Index. Dealers of Lightning is the riveting story of the legendary Xerox PARC - a collection of eccentric young inventors brought together by Xerox Corporation at a facility in Palo Alto, California, during the intellectual ferment of the seventies and eighties. Here for the first time Michael Hiltzik, a correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, reveals in detail the true story of the extraordinary group that aimed to bring about a technological dawn that would change the world - and succeeded. Dealers of Lightning is an unprecedented look at the ideas, the inventions, and the individuals that propelled Xerox PARC to the frontier of technohistory - and the corporate machinations that almost prevented it from achieving greatness.