In another good article by FastCoDesign, Jesus Diaz writes how Apple’s research group developed some of the most highly influential tech of the century. For example, a feature coming in macOS Mojave called Stacks automatically categorizes your files on the desktop. But Stacks isn’t a new technology, and evolved out of concepts that ATG worked on.
The ATG was founded in 1986 by Larry Tesler, a computer scientist who had previously worked at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center–aka PARC, the birthplace of the graphic user interface–before moving to Apple. The group’s mission was to create breakthrough technologies that didn’t need to be products.
Though they were introduced onstage at WWDC as “Stacks,” they were once known as “Piles.” It extended the desktop metaphor even further by allowing users to organize their files in stacks of papers, images, or videos, leaving folders for more permanent archival purposes–just like real life.
Check It Out: Apple’s Advanced Technology Group Changed the World