GUIs

My first experience with a GUI was the MacPlus.  I worked on one for more than a year doing what was then a new thing known as WYSIWYG, or What You See Is What You Get.  It was a big new thing when working with machines whose output was modeled after the typewriter.  Everything the computers did was monospace with each letter or character taking up the same amount of space.

I started with Windows when Windows was Version 3.1, changed to OS/2 Warp for about a year, switched back to windows 3.1 and upgraded to 3.11 then upgraded to Windows 95 and then Windows 98 and Windows 98 second edition which I ran for years.  I finally switched to Windows XP and later Windows 7.

In my travels on the internet I stumbled across a web page that talks about GUIs including the Apple II desktop, also known as the mouse desk.  It is mostly a series of screen shots with descriptions and comments.  If you are interested in mouse desk or Apple II desktop it is worth a look.  The website is at  http://toastytech.com/guis/a2desk.html and they have a similar set of screen shots for GEOS for the Apple II at http://toastytech.com/guis/a2geos.html is you are interested in GEOS.

If you have any interest in those other GUIs, go to one of the links above and you can click on a link for similar pages, on the left.  I personally liked OS/2 Warp but the industry did not really embrace it so there was not a lot of software for it like Windows.

Generally speaking with a traditional Apple II, I do not see a point in a GUI.  GUIs tend to eat up resources and the Apple II did not have a lot to start with.  In a fully loaded Apple II there may be a benefit, but I think that would be up to the user.

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