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Grid Compass
The Grid Compass is a family of laptop computers introduced in 1982 by the Grid Systems Corporation. The design for the Compass was rendered by Bill Moggridge. Owing to its clamshell design—the first in a portable computer—some historians credit the original Compass as the first ever laptop. This original model of Compass lacked an internal battery compartment, requiring AC power from the wall. Grid sold the succeeding model, the Compass II, in 1984 with an optional external battery unit. Grid replaced the Compass with the GridCase line in 1985. History Development of the Compass began in 1979, and the main buyer was the U.S. government. NASA used it on the Space Shuttle during the early 1980s, as it was powerful, lightweight, and compact. The military Special Forces also purchased the machine, as it could be used by paratroopers in combat. The National Security Agency was reportedly interested in a TEMPEST-compliant version produced by SAIC. Along with the Gavilan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bill Moggridge
William Grant Moggridge, Royal Designer for Industry, RDI (25 June 1943 – 8 September 2012) was an English designer, author and educator who cofounded the design company IDEO and was director of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York. He was a pioneer in adopting a human-centred approach in design, and championed interaction design as a mainstream design discipline (he is given credit for coining the term, together with Bill Verplank). Among his achievements, he designed the first laptop computer, the GRiD Compass, was honoured for Lifetime Achievement from the National Design Awards, and given the Prince Philip Designers Prize. He was quoted as saying, "If there is a simple, easy principle that binds everything I have done together, it is my interest in people and their relationship to things." Early life and education Bill Moggridge was born in London on June 25, 1943, to Helen (an artist) and Henry Weston Moggridge (a civil servant). Moggridge studied i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gavilan SC
The Gavilan SC is an early laptop, laptop computer first released by the Gavilan Computer Corporation in April 1984. The computer ran on an Intel 8088 microprocessor running at 5 MHz and sported a touchpad for a pointing device, one of the first computers to do so. The laptop was developed by Manuel Fernandez (businessman), Manuel "Manny" Fernandez, founder of the Gavilan Computer Corporation, and unveiled in May 1983. History The brainchild of Manuel Fernandez (businessman), Manuel "Manny" Fernandez, the Gavilan was unveiled at COMDEX#List_of_all_COMDEX_events, COMDEX/Spring '83 at the Georgia World Congress Center in late April 1983. It was unveiled a year after the Grid Compass, with which it shared several pioneering details, notably a Clamshell (form factor), clamshell design, in which the screen folds shut over the keyboard. The Gavilan, however, was more affordable than the Compass, at a list price of around USD, US$4000. Unlike the Compass, it was equipped with a flo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clamshell Design
Clamshell design is a form factor commonly used in the design of electronic devices and other manufactured objects. It is inspired by the morphology of the clam. The form factor has been applied to handheld game consoles, mobile phones (where it is often called a "flip phone"), and especially laptop computers. Clamshell devices are usually made of two sections connected by a hinge, each section containing either a flat panel display or an alphanumeric keyboard/ keypad, which can fold into contact together like a bivalve shell. Generally speaking, the interface components such as keys and display are kept inside the closed clamshell, protecting them from damage and unintentional use while also making the device shorter or narrower so it is easier to carry around. In many cases, opening the clamshell offers more surface area than when the device is closed, allowing interface components to be larger and easier to use than on devices which do not flip open. A disadvantage ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Industrial Design
Industrial design is a process of design applied to physical Product (business), products that are to be manufactured by mass production. It is the creative act of determining and defining a product's form and features, which takes place in advance of the manufacture or production of the product. Industrial manufacture consists of predetermined, standardized and repeated, often automated, acts of replication, while craft-based design is a process or approach in which the form of the product is determined personally by the product's creator largely concurrent with the act of its production. All manufactured products are the result of a design process, but the nature of this process can vary. It can be conducted by an individual or a team, and such a team could include people with varied expertise (e.g. designers, engineers, business experts, etc.). It can emphasize intuitive creativity or calculated Evidence-based design, scientific decision-making, and often emphasizes a mix of b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The UK includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland, and most of List of islands of the United Kingdom, the smaller islands within the British Isles, covering . Northern Ireland shares Republic of Ireland–United Kingdom border, a land border with the Republic of Ireland; otherwise, the UK is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel, the Celtic Sea and the Irish Sea. It maintains sovereignty over the British Overseas Territories, which are located across various oceans and seas globally. The UK had an estimated population of over 68.2 million people in 2023. The capital and largest city of both England and the UK is London. The cities o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
PC Compatibility
An IBM PC compatible is any personal computer that is Computer hardware, hardware- and software-compatible with the IBM Personal Computer (IBM PC) and its List of IBM Personal Computer models, subsequent models. Like the original IBM PC, an IBM PC–compatible computer uses an x86-based central processing unit, sourced either from Intel or a second source like AMD, Cyrix or Intel_8086#Derivatives_and_clones, other vendors such as Texas Instruments, Fujitsu, OKI (company), OKI, Mitsubishi or NEC and is capable of using interchangeable commodity hardware such as expansion cards. Initially such computers were referred to as PC clones, IBM clones or IBM PC clones, but the term "IBM PC compatible" is now a historical description only, as the vast majority of microcomputers produced since the 1990s are IBM compatible. IBM itself no longer sells personal computers, Acquisition of the IBM PC business by Lenovo, having sold its division to Lenovo in 2005. "Wintel" is a similar description ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IBM PC
The IBM Personal Computer (model 5150, commonly known as the IBM PC) is the first microcomputer released in the List of IBM Personal Computer models, IBM PC model line and the basis for the IBM PC compatible ''de facto'' standard. Released on August 12, 1981, it was created by a team of engineers and designers at IBM, International Business Machines (IBM), directed by William C. Lowe and Philip Don Estridge in Boca Raton, Florida. Powered by an x86-architecture Intel 8088 processor, the machine was based on open architecture and third-party peripherals. Over time, expansion cards and software technology increased to support it. The PC had influence of the IBM PC on the personal computer market, a substantial influence on the personal computer market; the specifications of the IBM PC became one of the most popular computer design standards in the world. The only significant competition it faced from a non-compatible platform throughout the 1980s was from Apple Inc., Apple's Maci ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Local-area Network
A local area network (LAN) is a computer network that interconnects computers within a limited area such as a residence, campus, or building, and has its network equipment and interconnects locally managed. LANs facilitate the distribution of data and sharing network devices, such as printers. The LAN contrasts the wide area network (WAN), which not only covers a larger geographic distance, but also generally involves leased telecommunication circuits or Internet links. An even greater contrast is the Internet, which is a system of globally connected business and personal computers. Ethernet and Wi-Fi are the two most common technologies used for local area networks; historical network technologies include ARCNET, Token Ring, and LocalTalk. Cabling Most wired network infrastructures utilize Category 5 or Category 6 twisted pair cabling with RJ45 compatible terminations. This medium provides physical connectivity between the Ethernet interfaces present on a large numb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IBM Minicomputer
Midrange computers, or midrange systems, were a class of computer systems that fell in between mainframe computers and microcomputers. This class of machine emerged in the 1960s, with models from Digital Equipment Corporation (PDP lines), Data General (NOVA), and Hewlett-Packard (HP 2100 and HP 3000) widely used in science and research as well as for business - and referred to as minicomputers. IBM favored the term "midrange computer" for their comparable, but more business-oriented systems. IBM midrange systems * System/3 (1969) was the first IBM midrange system. * System/32 (introduced in 1975) was a 16-bit single-user system also known as the IBM 5320. * System/34 (1977) was intended to be a successor to both the 3 and the 32. It had two 16-bit processors and ran the SSP operating system. * System/38 (1979) was the first midrange system to have an integrated relational database management system (DBMS). The S/38 had 48-bit addressing, and ran the CPF operating system ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
CP/M
CP/M, originally standing for Control Program/Monitor and later Control Program for Microcomputers, is a mass-market operating system created in 1974 for Intel 8080/Intel 8085, 85-based microcomputers by Gary Kildall of Digital Research, Digital Research, Inc. CP/M is a disk operating system and its purpose is to organize files on a magnetic storage medium, and to load and run programs stored on a disk. Initially confined to single-tasking on 8-bit processors and no more than 64 kilobytes of memory, later versions of CP/M added multi-user variations and were migrated to 16-bit processors. CP/M's core components are the ''Basic Input/Output System'' (BIOS), the ''Basic Disk Operating System'' (BDOS), and the ''Console Command Processor'' (CCP). The BIOS consists of drivers that deal with devices and system hardware. The BDOS implements the file system and provides system services to applications. The CCP is the command-line interpreter and provides some built-in commands. CP ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Osborne 1
The Osborne 1 is the first commercially successful portable computer, released on April 3, 1981 by Osborne Computer Corporation. It weighs , cost US$1,795, and runs the CP/M 2.2 operating system. It is powered from a wall socket, as it has no on-board battery, but it is still classed as a portable device since it can be hand-carried when the keyboard is closed. The computer shipped with a large bundle of software that was almost equivalent in value to the machine itself, a practice adopted by other CP/M computer vendors. Competitors quickly appeared, such as the Kaypro II. History The Osborne 1 was developed by Adam Osborne and designed by Lee Felsenstein, first announced in early 1981. Osborne, an author of computer books decided that he wanted to break the price of computers. The computer's design was based largely on the Xerox NoteTaker, a prototype developed at Xerox PARC in 1976 by Alan Kay. It was designed to be portable, with a rugged ABS plastic case and a handle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patent Rights
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A patent is not the grant of a right to make or use or sell. It does not, directly or indirectly, imply any such right. It grants only the right to exclude others. The supposition that a right to make is created by the patent grant is obviously inconsistent with the established distinctions between generic and specific patents, and with the well-known fact that a very considerable portion of the patents granted are in a field covered by a former relatively generic or basic patent, are tributary to such earlier patent, and cannot be practiced unless by license thereunder." – ''Herman v. Youngstown Car Mfg. Co.'', 191 F. 579, 584–85, 112 CCA 185 (6th Cir. 1911) In most countries, patent rights fall under private law and the patent holder mu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
