Computing Atlas

How Computing Was Built
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Xerox NoteTaker

Experimental Workstation

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The Xerox NoteTaker was a portable computer prototype built at Xerox PARC in Palo Alto, California, in 1978 by researchers including Adele Goldberg, Douglas Fairbairn and Larry Tesler, developed as a working realization of Alan Kay's earlier Dynabook concept, which had remained a proposal rather than a built machine. It combined an Intel 8086 processor running at 5 megahertz, 256 kilobytes of RAM, a built in seven inch monochrome touchscreen, a floppy disk drive and stereo speakers, and ran the Smalltalk environment originally developed for the Xerox Alto. Weighing about 22 kilograms and shaped like a portable sewing machine with a folding keyboard that revealed the screen, the NoteTaker never reached production, with only around ten prototypes built, but its form directly influenced later luggable computers such as the Osborne 1 and Compaq Portable.

Facts
Year
1978 1
Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

Xerox Alto, Systems

Both the Xerox Alto and the Xerox NoteTaker are Xerox PARC personal-computing research systems of the same design lineage; the NoteTaker realized Alan Kay's Dynabook concept in portable form.

Xerox Star, Systems

The Xerox NoteTaker (1978) and Xerox Star (1981) are both Xerox PARC personal-computing systems of the same design lineage; exact influence direction between them is not confirmed by the NoteTaker's own cited source.

Invented By

Larry Tesler, Pioneers

Larry Tesler was one of the Xerox PARC engineers (with Adele Goldberg and Douglas Fairbairn) who built the Xerox NoteTaker in 1978.

Sources
1. Wikipedia: Xerox NoteTaker
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The Xerox NoteTaker is a portable computer developed at Xerox PARC in Palo Alto, California, in 1978.
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