@jochenwolters@mastodon.social
Post #3166619
2026-04-30 00:55 UTC
@macinthrope@mastodon.social I never quite understood what the exact motivation was for Jobs to shut down OpenDoc. The fundamental concept of a shared canvas for different types of content with exchangeable editors and viewers for each content type always intrigued me. Compared to that concept, the established pattern of having different _applications_ for different content types feels simply like the computing stone age.
The “business publishing" package RagTime used the same paradigm, and it's mind-blowing.
Replies (1)
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@macinthrope@mastodon.social 2026-04-30 02:49
@jochenwolters@mastodon.social I think he saw people moving towards the web for sharing live data and “compound interactive documents”. OpenDoc was an interesting framework, but the paradigm was too forward looking and the UI was too messy (everything is a document, drag in stationary to create a frame, menus changing out from under you when clicking on an item, etc.).