Old and busted

The first-generation UI was the command line. Apple didn't invent it, but used the concept for early Apple computers.

The second-generation UI is the icon-based, folder-driven, resizable overlapping windows interface that we use today. Again, Apple didn't invent it -- Xerox did. But Apple was the first major company to build it into a consumer product, the original Macintosh computer, which came out in 1984.

Microsoft shipped its Windows Vista operating system last month, and Apple's next update to OS X is expected by late spring. Although these platforms contain elements of the next-generation UI, they're based on the same old folders, icons and windows paradigm from the 1980s.

I don't know about you, but I think 23 years is a long time to wait. I'm fed up and ready for the next radical leap forward in UI technology. You will, too, once you've seen the video I link to at the end of this column.