Ergonomics of the Symbolics Lisp Machine • Hacker News Board

Re: Ergonomics of the Symbolics Lisp Machine

#91

Post by rjsw » Fri, Jun 13, 2014, 12:15 PM UTC

lispm wrote: post #73

cpr wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but don't forget the microcode level that runs the Lisp code. Some very small bits of the OS were written in microcode (as few as possible), IIRC. (It's been a long time since I was hanging around the AI Lab. ;-)

The processor instruction set was implemented in Microcode. It was optimized to run compiled Lisp code. There was also a Lisp to Microcode compiler, though I haven't used it.

The microarchitecture of the MIT/LMI/TI machines wasn't particularly complicated, it had pipelined 3-address load-store instructions just like the first RISC CPUs. Apart from the functions to handle each Lisp instruction the microcode was basically a simple RTOS. In my view, the clever part of the design was in picking the minimal features needed from the microcode to allow everything else to be writtin in Lisp.

There was a proposal from Sun for a Java OS that seemed to me to copy the same split.

It is a pity that all the Ivory papers that were in journals still seem to be behind paywalls.

Re: Ergonomics of the Symbolics Lisp Machine

#92

Post by DonHopkins » Sat, Jun 14, 2014, 3:59 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #49

The real ergonomics of the LispM were due to the wonderful Microswitch keyboards, which have never been equalled since. To use one was a kind of revelation into the the apotheosis of keyboard use. (The old, original Tom Knight AI Lab keyboards were even slightly more wonderful; the later Microswitch LispM keyboards never quite equalled the originals in terms of tactilely satisfying feel.) (For a long while after leav…

It was not just the hardware, or the software, or the culture, or the interesting problems you could solve, or the zeitgeist of that time in history, but a rich combination of all those things and more, that is so hard to capture, describe or reproduce -- or even believe, if you haven't experienced it first hand.

Those giant keyboards, with all their wide special purpose buttons topped with hieroglyphic keycap labels, in combination with the huge screen, three button mouse, and of course all the great software turning on and off the little dots on the screen that you could dive into, explore and modify at will, the printed and online documentation, the networked developer support community, all carefully designed to work together seamlessly regardless of cost, gave you the feeling of being in control of a very heavy, expensive, well built, solid, powerful, luxury automobile, with rich Corinthian leather seats, a high fidelity sound system, cruise and climate control, power steering, windows and seats, a full tank of gas and an empty ashtray, a glove compartment stuffed with AAA maps, about to embark on a long and adventurous journey exploring far away places you've never visited before.

It's hard to capture that kind of multi-sensory ergonometric computational Fahrvergnügen, just running it in an emulator on a MacBook Pro. (As luxurious and well designed as the MBP is, it can't hold a candle to a Lisp Machine.)

Sitting down in front of one of those monsters with a big mug of coffee, an interesting task to work on, a rack of my favorite music on cassette tapes, many hours of free time to hack in the privacy of an air conditioned lab in front of me, and a bean bag chair for naps when I pass out from exhaustion behind me, will always be one of my cherished memories.

Ricardo Montalban couldn't have expressed the luxurious feeling of power and control more eloquently: "I have much more in this small Chrysler than great comfort at a most pleasant price. I have great confidence, for which there can be no price. In Cordova, I have what I need." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vsg97bxuJnc

Re: Ergonomics of the Symbolics Lisp Machine

#93

Post by DonHopkins » Sat, Jun 14, 2014, 4:23 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #31

eudox wrote: post #8

Related: A huge collections of images showing Symbolics UI and the software written for it: http://lispm.de/symbolics-ui-examples/symbolics-ui-examples....

Nice, but I wouldn't confuse static images with the underlying semantic graph of live objects that's not visible in pictures.

Precisely! When Lisp Machine programmer look at a screen dump, they see a lot more going on behind the scenes than meets the eye.

I'll attempt to explain the deep implications of what the article said about "Everything on the screen is an object, mouse-sensitive and reusable":

There's a legendary story about Gyro hacking away on a Lisp Machine, when he accidentally trashed the function cell of an important primitive like AREF (or something like that -- I can't remember the details -- do you, Scott? Or does Devon just make this stuff up? ;), and that totally crashed the operating system.

It dumped him into a "cold load stream" where he could poke around at the memory image, so he clamored around the display list, a graph of live objects (currently in suspended animation) behind the windows on the screen, and found an instance where the original value of the function pointer had been printed out in hex (which of course was a numeric object that let you click up a menu to change its presentation, etc).

He grabbed the value of the function pointer out of that numeric object, poked it back into the function cell where it belonged, pressed the "Please proceed, Governor" button, and was immediately back up and running where he left off before the crash, like nothing had ever happened!

Here's another example of someone pulling themselves back up by their bootstraps without actually cold rebooting, thanks to the real time help of the networked Lisp Machine user community:

ftp://ftp.ai.sri.com/pub/mailing-lists/slug/900531/msg00339.html

Re: Ergonomics of the Symbolics Lisp Machine

#94

Post by gcb0 » Wed, Jun 18, 2014, 8:33 PM UTC

hga wrote: post #84

gcb0 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

model m is overrrated amd loud. cherry stopped in time. alps lowered standards to fight off bad income. ...good switches help you feel the key and avoid bottom out. i personally like old complex alps, but everyone will like something different.

" good switches help you feel the key and avoid bottom out " To deal with bottoming out, using Cherry Blue switches, I've found that these red dampeners work very nicely: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AZQ3966/ There are also thicker ones that have better stocking: http://www.amazon.com/Cherry-Rubber-O-Ring-Switch-Dampeners/... and the same company has a nice key puller: www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AZCGF7K/

lol at mechanical keyboard related stuff prices.

i bought the same orings (internal, external diameter. hardness) from a hardware store. paid $3.78.

...and you linked to the cheap ones :)