Post-WIMP user interfaces

Abstract

arge set of software -engineering tools for building WIMP interfaces. I find it rather surprising that the third generation of WIMP user interfaces has been so dominant for more than two decades; they are apparently sufficiently good for conventional desktop tasks that the field is stuck comfortably in a rut. I argue in this essay that the status quo does not suffice ---that the newer forms of computing and computing devices available today necessitate new thinking the human connection Andries van Dam Post-WIMP User Interfaces U NLIKE THE STEADY, PREDICTABLE HARDWARE PRICE/PERFORMANCE improvement described by Moore's law, there has been no such year-to-year progress in user interface design. Instead, the history of user interfaces can be characterized using evolutionary biologist Steven Jay Gould's notion of punctuated equilibrium: long periods of stability interrupted by rapid change. We can identify fo