TEL Quality and Innovation: What can be learned from the history of computer science
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As TEL becomes more professionalised we consider what lessons can be learned from another discipline which has gone through a similar transition. Through the lense of the development of computer science this presentation will look at key moments in this area which might be used to inform or influence how we approach TEL quality and innovation. As part of this we will highlight the approaches adopted by early pioneers like Alan Kay whose attributed to defining the conceptual basics of laptop and tablet computers as part of his work in the 1970s on the Dynabook. Kay (2014) argues when creating future concepts the present inevitably takes all of our focus making anything we do incremental rather than inspirational. Kay’s suggests that by ignoring the present this opens us to the opportunity to take greater inspiration from the past allowing us to dream of a future not constrained by the present. We also consider some of the cultures which have their origins in computer science including the ‘hacker’ subculture. Whilst the term ‘hacker’ has taken on a more sinister definition, referring to those subverting computer security, the original hacker communities founded by Richard Greenblatt and Bill Gosper in the 1960s were focused on the “intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming and circumventing limitations of systems to achieve novel and clever outcomes” - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_culture Finally, we highlight a talk by Bret Victor on the future of programming we look at the reasons a number of innovations in computer science happened in the 50s/60s and the problems this creates for the next generation of programmers if they perceive the fundamentals are correct and continue to develop along these principles.
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TEL Quality and Innovation: What can be learned from the history of computer science
- 1. TEL Quality and Innovation: What can be learned from the history of computer science Martin Hawksey @mhawksey EdTech2018 – May 31st and June 1st 2018 TEL Quality Matters - People, Policies and Practices This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. CC-BY mhawksey Slides go.alt.ac.uk/TELCompSci
- 3. ©Bret Victor 09-Jul-2013 https://vimeo.com/71278954 The Mother of All Demos
- 4. alt.ac.uk NLS oN-Line System: Firsts ◊ the computer mouse ◊ 2-dimensional display editing ◊ in-file object addressing, linking ◊ hypermedia ◊ outline processing ◊ flexible view control ◊ multiple windows ◊ cross-file editing ◊ integrated hypermedia email ◊ hypermedia publishing ◊ document version control ◊ shared-screen teleconferencing ◊ computer-aided meetings ◊ formatting directives ◊ context-sensitive help ◊ distributed client-server architecture ◊ uniform command syntax ◊ universal "user interface" front-end module ◊ multi-tool integration ◊ grammar-driven command language interpreter ◊ protocols for virtual terminals ◊ remote procedure call protocols ◊ compilable "Command Meta Language" @mhawksey 4
- 6. alt.ac.uk@mhawksey 6 ©Alan Kay April 2014 https://youtu.be/gTAghAJcO1o
- 7. ©Thomas Hawk https://flic.kr/p/fiGngo Richard Greenblatt and Thomas Knight with the CADR LISP Machine at MIT 1978 Credit Line: Courtesy of MIT hackers individuals who enjoy the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming and circumventing limitations of systems to achieve novel and clever outcomes
- 8. 8©David Lofink https://flic.kr/p/7BX4hX “the most important things in history are really done by communities of people working together” – Alan Kay
- 10. @mhawksey 10 "they didn’t know what they were doing, so they tried everything - Bret Victor Bret Victor https://vimeo.com/71278954
- 11. @mhawksey 11 "The most dangerous thought you can have as a creative person is to think you know what you're doing." - Richard Hamming Bret Victor https://vimeo.com/71278954
- 12. @mhawksey 12 "Knowledge is essential. Past ideas are essential. Knowledge and ideas that have coalesced into theory is one of the most beautiful creations of the human species." - Bret Victor Bret Victor https://vimeo.com/71278954
- 13. @mhawksey 13CC-BY-NC Alyson Hurt https://flic.kr/p/49v7KZ
- 15. Association for Learning Technology Registered charity number: 1160039 www.alt.ac.uk @A_L_T
Editor's Notes
- Ada Lovelace was an English mathematician and writer, chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's proposed mechanical general-purpose computer, the Analytical Engine. Edith Clarke was the first female electrical engineer and the first female professor of electrical engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. She specialized in electrical power system analysis and wrote Circuit Analysis of A-C Power Systems and inventor of the Clarke calculator Grace Brewster Murray Hopper was an American computer scientist and United States Navy rear admiral. One of the first programmers of the Harvard Mark Icomputer, she was a pioneer of computer programming who invented one of the first compiler related tools. She popularized the idea of machine-independent programming languages, which led to the development of COBOL, an early high-level programming language still in use today. Evelyn Boyd Granville part of the team of scientists responsible for writing the computer programs that tracked the paths of vehicles in space on NASA’s Project Vanguard and Project Mercury. Mary Kenneth Keller participated in the development of the BASIC programming language with John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz. She helped to establish the Association of Small Computer Users in Education (ASCUE) John Bryne ‘The Father of Computing in Ireland’, Professor of Engineering in Trinity from 1957 to 1985, led the development of Computer Science as an academic discipline in Ireland.
- The mother of all demos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VScVgXM7lQQ&list=PLCGFadV4FqU2yAqCzKaxnKKXgnJBUrKTE The first prototype of a computer mouse, as designed by Bill Englishfrom Engelbart's sketches.[1] "The Mother of All Demos" is a name retroactively applied to a landmark computer demonstration, given at the Association for Computing Machinery / Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (ACM/IEEE)—Computer Society's Fall Joint Computer Conference in San Francisco, which was presented by Douglas Engelbart on 9 December, 1968.[citation needed] The live demonstration featured the introduction of a complete computer hardware and software system called the oN-Line System or, more commonly, NLS. The 90-minute presentation essentially demonstrated almost all the fundamental elements of modern personal computing: windows, hypertext, graphics, efficient navigation and command input, video conferencing, the computer mouse, word processing, dynamic file linking, revision control, and a collaborative real-time editor (collaborative work). Engelbart's presentation was the first to publicly demonstrate all of these elements in a single system. The demonstration was highly influential and spawned similar projects at Xerox PARC in the early 1970s. The underlying technologies influenced both the Apple Macintosh and Microsoft Windows graphical user interface operating systems in the 1980s and 1990s
- Alan Kay In 1970 he joined Xerox Corporation's Palo Alto Research Center, PARC. He conceived the Dynabook concept which defined the conceptual basics for laptop and tablet computers and E-books, and is the architect of the modern overlapping windowing graphical user interface (GUI) The Future Doesn't Have to Be Incremental https://youtu.be/gTAghAJcO1o
- As part of Kay’s talk he illustrated how when creating future concepts the present inevitably takes all of our focus making anything we do incremental rather than inspirational. Kay’s suggests that by ignoring the present, this opens us to the opportunity to take greater inspiration from the past allowing us to dream of a future not constrained by the present.
- Richard Greenblatt along with Bill Gosper are considered to considered to have founded the hacker community which evolved from MIT in the 1960s. The hacker culture is a subculture of individuals who enjoy the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming and circumventing limitations of systems to achieve novel and clever outcomes
- Alan’s comment on one of Doug Engelbart’s doctrines: the most important things in history are really done by communities of people working together
- An edit of Bret Victor (https://vimeo.com/80274717) - The Future of Programming Presented at Dropbox's DBX conference on July 9, 2013 Full version at vimeo.com/71278954 The key points of Victor’s talk is ask why did these leaps in computing happen during this period and why did the momentum not continue. In the talk Victor explains programming was in a pre-paradigm phase: they didn’t know what they were doing, so they tried everything The problem for the next generation of programmers is they perceive the fundamentals are correct and continue to develop along these principles. The next generation of programmers shown only one way to programme which they go on to teach to the next. You could argue that education has a similar problem, the next generation of teachers will no doubt be influenced by their own personal experience as a student. The next generation of teachers thinking it’s all been figured out … the danger being we get stuck: The most dangerous thought you can have as a creative person is to think you know what you’re doing. Once you think you know what you are doing you stop looking around for other ways of doing things.
- But I want to be clear -- I am not advocating ignorance. Instead, I'm suggesting a kind of informed skepticism, a kind of humility. Ignorance is remaining willfully unaware of the existing base of knowledge in a field, proudly jumping in and stumbling around. This approach is fashionable in certain hacker/maker circles today, and it's poison. Knowledge is essential. Past ideas are essential. Knowledge and ideas that have coalesced into theory is one of the most beautiful creations of the human species. http://worrydream.com/#!/dbx
- But I want to be clear -- I am not advocating ignorance. Instead, I'm suggesting a kind of informed skepticism, a kind of humility. Ignorance is remaining willfully unaware of the existing base of knowledge in a field, proudly jumping in and stumbling around. This approach is fashionable in certain hacker/maker circles today, and it's poison. Knowledge is essential. Past ideas are essential. Knowledge and ideas that have coalesced into theory is one of the most beautiful creations of the human species. http://worrydream.com/#!/dbx
- But I want to be clear -- I am not advocating ignorance. Instead, I'm suggesting a kind of informed skepticism, a kind of humility. Ignorance is remaining willfully unaware of the existing base of knowledge in a field, proudly jumping in and stumbling around. This approach is fashionable in certain hacker/maker circles today, and it's poison. Knowledge is essential. Past ideas are essential. Knowledge and ideas that have coalesced into theory is one of the most beautiful creations of the human species. http://worrydream.com/#!/dbx