First, there was the terminal.
DOS
You typed text. Scrolling text came back. It was:
- Powerful
- Flexible for power users
- Easy to program
But also, since it was centered around a blank input field, it was:
- Daunting
- Unintuitive
- Bad for selecting and manipulating stuff
Fortunately, in the intervening decades our user interfaces got much better. We got graphical interfaces. We got direct manipulation, visual navigation, and rich thoughtful user experiences. It was great!
now...