the innovations of apple?

[krossfyter]

okay help me out here guys. im trying to get a list of what apple has innovated that actually had some type of benefit outside of their computers.

for example...

Apple invented the personal computer... the first GUI, with the iMac Apple reinvented the personal computer, Apple created the first music download service that is practical AND legal, just to name a few.. etc.


so anything else?


*puts on some flame retardent pajamas just in case*

[bousozoku]

Unicode was a joint development between Apple, IBM, and Xerox. It is the basis for cross-platform use of multiple languages where little existed prior to it. Apple's WorldScript and relevant research led to this innovation.

Remember that Apple didn't invent the first GUI--they developed the first commercially-accepted GUI.

[krossfyter]

oh okay.. right sorry. thanks for that extra info.


yeah i keep on forgeting... apple didnt invent the first gui they just made it commercially accepted... like what nirvana did for grunge.


lol

[TEG]

Apple used the first commercial Mouse, Developed the First commercial hard disk File table (Mac File System), the first commercial multitasking UI, the first accepeted 3.5" disks, and the first computer to reliable use USB for all legacy conncetions (ie. Mouse and KB).

TEG

[krossfyter]

okay so lets see here... we have as apple innovations/invents so far:


1. first personal computer
2. first commercially accepted GUI
3. reinvention of the personal computer (imac)
4. first music download service thats practical and legal
5. unicode ... apples world-script led to this innovation


anything else?


didn't they also create the firewire thing?

sorry about being technically sloppy here... but really being technically proficient in apple history is not my thing.... i wish it were... but its not so i do apologize to those that are.

[krossfyter]

Originally posted by TEG
Apple used the first commercial Mouse, Developed the First commercial hard disk File table (Mac File System), the first commercial multitasking UI, the first accepeted 3.5" disks, and the first computer to reliable use USB for all legacy conncetions (ie. Mouse and KB).

TEG

okay just noticed this after i posted my previous post. allow me to update on my next post. thanks for helping out... really.

[krossfyter]

(((((update #1))))

okay so lets see here... we have as apple innovations/invents so far:


1. first personal computer
2. first commercially accepted GUI
3. reinvention of the personal computer (imac)
4. first music download service thats practical and legal
5. unicode ... apples world-script led to this innovation
6. first commercial mouse
7. first commercial hard disk file table (mac file system)
8. first commercial multitasking UI
9. first accepted 3.5 disks
10. first computer to reliably use USB for all legacy connections (ie. Mouse and KB)


good stuff man. juicy. makes for a great case so far.

thanks for the help from you all so far. im anticipating whats next.

[Fukui]

They did not invent the first personal computer. What they did though, was invent the first trully "commercially viable" personal computer with the Apple 1 and especially Apple 2 (II).

They did, in the UI, invent a lot of things that PARC (the only game in town who wouldn't market thier tech) wouldn't.
Some of those include the double click, the dragable icon, the pull-down menu, overlapping windows, etc. They also invented the first PDA (at least commercialy) that also had natural hand writting recognition....

If you really want to wow someone, show them the Lisa Office system (precursor to the mac), it had a totaly integrated spreadsheet, document, presentation and drawing software built in!! Quite amazing for 1983 tech...

Today, they kinda did the same thing with say expose, quartz (full PDF quality compositing in UI), qaurtz extreme (hardware acceleration of UI - only windows for now) etc. I am sure you could find lots of things...

[krossfyter]

Originally posted by Fukui
They did not invent the first personal computer. What they did though, was invent the first trully "commercially viable" personal computer with the Apple 1 and especially Apple 2 (II).

They did, in the UI, invent a lot of things that PARC (the only game in town who wouldn't market thier tech) wouldn't.
Some of those include the double click, the dragable icon, the pull-down menu, overlapping windows, etc. They also invented the first PDA (at least commercialy) that also had natural hand writting recognition....

If you really want to wow someone, show them the Lisa Office system (precursor to the mac), it had a totaly integrated spreadsheet, document, presentation and drawing software built in!! Quite amazing for 1983 tech...

Today, they kinda did the same thing with say expose, quartz (full PDF quality compositing in UI), qaurtz extreme (hardware acceleration of UI - only windows for now) etc. I am sure you could find lots of things...


woah. okay hold on here for a sec. first...can you make a list of those inventions/innovations that you noted in your response... you know to kinda clarify it a bit more for a list so i dont get it wrong.
second... i thought apple did inevnt the first personal computer. who did then?


thanks by the way for your glorious contribution. you have been whitelisted.

;)

[wdlove]

Wasn't Apple the first to introduce the use of icons.

[anubis]

As far as i can tell, apple was directly responsible for the adaptation of the following technologies by the computing world:

Icons
Menus
Fonts
Postscript printers
3.5-inch disk drives
CD-ROM (most people seem to be forgetting this!)
USB
Firewire (ieee 1394)
Mouse
Digital video (quicktime)

[krossfyter]

Originally posted by anubis
As far as i can tell, apple was directly responsible for the adaptation of the following technologies by the computing world:

Icons
Menus
Fonts
Postscript printers
3.5-inch disk drives
CD-ROM (most people seem to be forgetting this!)
USB
Firewire (ieee 1394)
Mouse
Digital video (quicktime)

would apple be creater/inventor of said technologies or would they only be the ones who made it "commercially acceptable".... you know that nirvana grunge thing?

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by anubis
As far as i can tell, apple was directly responsible for the adaptation of the following technologies by the computing world:

Icons
Menus
Fonts
Postscript printers
3.5-inch disk drives
CD-ROM (most people seem to be forgetting this!)
USB
Firewire (ieee 1394)
Mouse
Digital video (quicktime)

I believe you meant adoption, not adaptation. ;)

John Warnock and Adobe were responsible for PostScript and digital typefaces but it was Apple who allowed the technology to be used by an average company.

Apple, with Macintosh and LaserWriter (Canon print engine), brought about the acronym WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get).

[Fukui]

Originally posted by krossfyter
woah. okay hold on here for a sec. first...can you make a list of those inventions/innovations that you noted in your response... you know to kinda clarify it a bit more for a list so i dont get it wrong.
second... i thought apple did inevnt the first personal computer. who did then?
;)
Who knows who exactly was the "one" who invented the PC...its kinda like a lot of hobbyists were makeing stuff (comps) for themselves because they didn't like having to share a giant IBM mainframe (dinosaur) with everyone else, they wanted one that was personal, apple is the only one from the old days (70's) to have survived the IBM Clones.

If I Listed it, then...

Invented the forebearer to all moder 2-D UI's
This included: Double Click
Drag and Drop
Shortcuts (alias files)
Pull down menus
Overlaping windows

Later on, they created the first "PDA" the newton that had pretty good H/W recognition for something in 1993.
(Notice that tablet PC is basically just continuing where they left off...)

Quarts Extreme, the first 2-D UI to be Graphics Processor Accelerated (mapping windows to Polygons in an actual 3-D scene)

Also, quartz itself was the first of its kind to take Photoshop quality graphics proccessing and turn it into a UI for PCs.

Don't forget also one of the first companies to integrate 802.11 into thier line-up (Wi-fi/Airport)

And, the lisa office system, that was basically the first integrated office suite, came out in 1983, forbearer to MS Office....

Good enough?

[Powerbook G5]

Apple was the first to use CD-ROMs, the first to use the term "multimedia", the first to use color matching (colorsync), pioneered Firewire, came up with the "trash can" idea of files not being deleted once the system is powered down (having to empty the trash can), and I am sure there are lots others I am missing to add to the list.

[Doraemon]

You should be careful about what Apple INVENTED and what they PIONEERED.

That's a major difference!

Apple did not invent the CD-ROM drive, FireWire, USB, Mouse, 3.5" floppy, etc.

[bousozoku]

Apple did create FireWire. The date I've seen connected with the development of the technology was 1986. I find it a little early but it's certainly possible that they patented the idea and not the implementation.

As far as hard disk file table, Macintosh File System (MFS) did not work with hard drives. The Hierarchial File System (HFS) was created to do that.

While the term personal computer is up for debate, there are several candidates:

Apple II (MOS Technologies 6502)
Commodore PET (MOS Technologies 6502)
Altair 8800 (Intel 8008)
Radio Shack TRS-80 (Zilog Z80)

All of these were called microcomputers and later, Commodore VIC and Atari 400/800 were called home computers. It was only when the IBM PC arrived, that the term Personal Computer was actually used.

[mrjamin]

weren't apple the first to use 802.11b commercially?

[Powerbook G5]

Originally posted by Doraemon
You should be careful about what Apple INVENTED and what they PIONEERED.

That's a major difference!

Apple did not invent the CD-ROM drive, FireWire, USB, Mouse, 3.5" floppy, etc.

I did not say that Apple invented CD-ROM, I said they were the first to use CD-ROM in a computer. If I remember correctly, it was a joint venture between Philips and Sony that came up with the CD format. Firewire was created by Apple, though, and USB was pioneered by Apple, but if I remember correctly, Apple did have a hand in the creation of that standard as well. Apple got the mouse from Xerox but they were the first to implement it along with the first with incorporating the idea of using software drivers to run hardware (such as using a driver to make the mouse work). I can't say I know who created the 3.5" floppy drive, but Apple was the first to use them in a computer.

[applemacdude]

The first consumer digital camera (a.k.a Quicktake 100)(Which was actually a Kodak camera with Apple's name on it.)

They made multimedia standard.

Innovator if Photo Cd's.

[bousozoku]

The Kodak DC40 and the Apple QuickTake 100 were both made by Kyocera (Kyoto Ceramics).

USB, along with PCI were both Intel developments. The methods USB devices use indicate that Intel took apart ADB (Apple Desktop Bus) devices during their development of USB.

The 3.5 inch diskette was developed by Sony. The one we know is the second iteration. The original had a manual shutter which had to be opened before you inserted the diskette into the drive. Hitachi's 3.0 inch diskette had the automatic shutter first.

[dxp4acu]

were they the first to use dvd burners and slot drives in laptops? Just look at the PB G4 right now and the PM G5 for innovations...

What things does the G5 have that are firsts? PCI-X, etc.

Also, was the first to use 802.11g commercially, as well as .mp4 and .aac.

First to use Firewire in an mp3 player?

Any Mac OS X contributions?

[blogo]

Speech recognition
iMovie

[dxp4acu]

yeah, if anyone has the toby mac cd "momentum" (He is one of the three guys from DC Talk), song 4 is a small rap featuring one of the computer voices from Mac OS. It was pretty tight.

So, is the Mac the only OS that talks to you? I can't remember hearing a Dell say something. I loved that feature. I could say commands to my computer that I set up with Apple Script and it would do them. That's a first, right? I mean, we are talking 1997-1998 or so here.

[bousozoku]

I found a reference to Personal Computing. It was a 1980 advertisement for a magazine in the January 1981 BYTE magazine.

The partial scan is below. (It would be more straight but I wasn't about to rip it out of the magazine.)

[stoid]

Apple's PowerBook 100 was the first practical portable computer (one you could put in a briefcase and not just your trunk).

InkWell originally featured on the Newton, first handwriting recognition and first handheld computer respectively.

The G4 was the first personal computer that had exports sanctioned by the federal government.

The G5 was the first 64-bit personal computer.


Preemptively: The G-squared is the first quantum computer operating at the molecular level based on the 32 quantum states of an electron that is available in a personal computer. :D

[bryanc]

If we skip the argument about whether Apple invented or just 'Pioneered', we should also include things like LCD monitors for desktops (iMac / cinema displays), multiple independently regulated thermal zones (in the G5), air port and airport extreme, USB (1 and 2), firewire, 64 bit CPUs, GUIs (and most, if not all of the elements of GUIs that make them better than CLIs...expose being the latest, and, IMHO, greatest), CDs and DVDs in computers, the mouse, colour synch, speech recognition, handwriting recognition, most useful 'universal access' features, multilingual support, the online music store, a workable DRM model, quartz extreme (what's the wintel copy of this going to be called?), fibre-optic digital audio, Rendezvous (automatic network resource recognition and configuring), plug-and-play, titanium and aluminum enclosures, illuminated keyboards, a UNIX-based OS that *anyone* can use, the digital hub, legal music sharing, and a GUI people want to lick :-)

Cheers

don't forget iApps...real, seriously useful, easy-to-use, non-spyware applications that come with your computer.

Oh yeah...and Quicktime

[bousozoku]

Macintosh was the first computer to have square pixels, something that IBM touted 3 years later when they introduced VGA.

The Macintosh Plus was the first desktop computer to have digital audio. It was also the first desktop computer with built-in networking (LocalTalk) and built-in SCSI.

[patrick0brien]

Originally posted by Doraemon
You should be careful about what Apple INVENTED and what they PIONEERED.

That's a major difference!

Apple did not invent the CD-ROM drive, FireWire, USB, Mouse, 3.5" floppy, etc.

-Doraemon

Actually according to every source I've searched, Apple did 'invent' the CD-ROM drive in 1987. Invent here was in semiquote because all they did was take a CD player and hook it to a SCSI chain to see if they could.

It worked.

And certainly invented from the ground up FireWire in 1986.

I have a more complete - and heavily researched - list of Computing milestones (note that word) starting with the modern Abacus out of 13th century China. But it's not on this machine - ironically it's on my 12PB that a colleague is borrowing right now, so I'll post it later.

It is interesting to note that the latter entries of the list is dominated by Apple.

BTW- some will recognize this list as I've posted it before.

[bousozoku]

I've gone further back and found an earlier reference to Personal Computing in the January 1977 issue of BYTE magazine.

There is also an advertisement for the IMSAI 8080 personal computer in the same issue.

[applemacdude]

Originally posted by stoid


The G5 was the first 64-bit personal computer.



Actually Sun made the first 64-bit computers. well we can say that it was a the first commercial available consumer computer

[patrick0brien]

-All

Here's the master list. And please don't ask me to find the sources - it was hard enough to compile.

For those who want to know, this originated with a patent search, and I've kept it up since.

I sure hope it fits...

EDIT: I want you to pay close attention to the wordings here. As applemacdude said, it is not true that the G5 was the first 64-bit computer, it is true that is was the First 64-Bit Microprocessor-Based Desktop Personal Computer.

[Powerbook G5]

One question about the chart- I thought the G5 (PPC 970) does not incorporate hyperthreading? Or do you mean hypertransport?

[patrick0brien]

Originally posted by Powerbook G5
One question about the chart- I thought the G5 (PPC 970) does not incorporate hyperthreading? Or do you mean hypertransport?

-Powerbook G5

It's possible, that was a copy/paste from the article.

Can you help define? I'm always looking for clarifications.

[Powerbook G5]

I just remember a discussion over the summer about the 970 and the future Power5/980 and how the 980 will incorporate hyperthreading. I know the Pentium 4 line has HT and there was a debate about how the G5 would have benefitted from it if it were implemented as well. As far as Hypertransport is concerned, I don't know much about the origin besides it was developed I believe by AMD when they acquired a team of developers from Alpha.

[bousozoku]

HyperTransport is used in the G5 computer, but is not present in the PPC970 itself.

Wozniak would be pleased to have his name corrected in your list. :)

Also, I would contend that CP/M was the first widespread use of a standardised operating system. This was written by Gary Kildall, who founded Digital Research (in 1978, I believe.) It was the original that was copied by Tim Paterson to create 86-DOS, which became MS-DOS.

spelling errors. :D

[Ajmbc]

Originally posted by dxp4acu

So, is the Mac the only OS that talks to you? I can't remember hearing a Dell say something. I loved that feature. I could say commands to my computer that I set up with Apple Script and it would do them. That's a first, right? I mean, we are talking 1997-1998 or so here.

Does anyone remember the old, "It's not my fault!" :p

Originally posted by bryanc
... quartz extreme (what's the wintel copy of this going to be called?), ...


Aero, the most obvious rip-off of Apple yet. :D

[patrick0brien]

Originally posted by bousozoku
HyperTransport is used in the G5 computer, but is not present in the PPC970 itself.

Wozniak would be pleased to have his name corrected in your list. :)

Also, I would content that CP/M was the first widespread use of a standardised operating system. This was written by Gary Kildall, who founded Digital Research (in 1978, I believe.) It was the original that was copied by Tim Paterson to create 86-DOS, which became MS-DOS.

-bousozoku

Corrected, thanks! I_can't_believe_I_had_the_Woz's_name_spelled_wrong_all_this_time.

I'm embarrassed.

As for the CP/M OS, do you have a release date?

[bousozoku]

Originally posted by patrick0brien
-bousozoku

Corrected, thanks! I_can't_believe_I_had_the_Woz's_name_spelled_wrong_all_this_time.

I'm embarrassed.

As for the CP/M OS, do you have a release date?

I'll research it, but I have an advertisement in January 1978 for it. I should have an article in one of these BYTE issues.

[bousozoku]

Okay, here's the first advertisement I can find. I've yet to find an article on it; although, I found a user review of an Apple II (not +, not e). :)

Note that the July 1977 ad specifies that CP/M has been available to OEMs for over 3 years.