<i>Pads differ from conventional portable computers in one crucial way. Whereas portable computers go everywhere with their owners, the pad that must be carried from place to place is a failure. Pads are intended to be "scrap computers" (analogous to scrap paper) that can be grabbed and used anywhere; they have no individualized identity or importance.</i><p>That sounds eerily appealing. It speaks to my preference for a multi-device lifestyle where portable devices are but terminals to my network of applications running on my singular compute host. And yet, that's nothing quite like that today. Today, despite my desire to buy what I call a "subservient tablet," [1] I have no such option. Instead, tablets are first-order computers on their own right, adding to the number of devices in my life that want constant attention.<p>I find it a shame that in the real present-day, we're off on this curious tangent where every device has to stand on its own as a silo of computing.<p>In fact, it's a shame many of the concepts described in this article from 1991 still don't exist. Most notably, I am especially interested in large form-factor displays.<p>[1] <a href="http://tiamat.tsotech.com/microsoft" rel="nofollow">http://tiamat.tsotech.com/microsoft</a>
Mark Weiser was a professor of mine at the University of Maryland before he went to PARC. It was an awful tragedy that he died at such a young age (46). With the rise of tablets and small, powerful computers like the Raspberry Pi and the Arduino, I'm often reminded of his ideas about ubiquitous computing. He'd be having a ball today with all of the power one can now get in such tiny, efficient packages. It would be great if more of his UC ideas were to get into the mainstream of computing.