Interface Seams

Paper and Computers

October, 1997

Paper is the most important non-electronic artifact associated with computers.

Paper as Medium

Paper was second only to console lights as the original output medium. At one point, there was talk of the "paperless office". Actually, paper use is up as everybody gets a computer and printer.

Paper Prototypes

Why build a sample interface using code? Code requires a programmer and a lot of work. Instead, let users play with colored paper, scissors, and tape. It's fun, and it puts users on an equivalent level with developers. [ref Rettig]

Paper as Metaphor

The idea of the computer screen working as a virtual sheet of paper has inspired much of the progress in personal computer user interface design. Terms such as "cut-and-paste" reveal the metaphor. The notion of WYSIWYG ("What You See Is What You Get") has pushed both screen and printer design.

Paper as Book as Metaphor

Books represent a model for efficient use of information. They have inspired hypertext [ref Superbook] and library systems [ref das bookhaus]. The written word is powerful - it can be skimmed or studied as necessary. We use tools such as a table of contents, an index, or footnotes, that can be carried into the computer domain.

Paper as Input

Paper can be used as an input medium. While OCR (optical character recognition) is not perfect, it is effective enough to be used for things such as resume banks and text searching [ref O'Gorman]. [?? CHI 95??] describes a system that keeps track of what it prints, so a scanned document that was printed can be directly recognized.

Paper as Ubiquity

The goal of ubiquitous computing is to build a world of smart devices that provide "embodied virtuality" [ref Kay]. Paper is not smart, but it is ubiquitous. We let it fade into the background, but as I look around my dining room I see books, receipts, art, boxes, address labels, magazines, newspapers, and warning labels. Paper is symbol-oriented, and omni-present.

Why Paper?

Paper has admirable properties:

Inexpensive
Manipulable
Persistent. Compare to the spoken word which has only been captured as sound for a century.
Symbol-oriented. Paper lets us record words and pictures. Many artifacts "just are" - their reason for their present form is not obvious. Symbols let us have artifacts that try to explain themselves.
Easy-to-use. Learning time is long, but once reading is learned, paper is very effective.
Fast. Reading is much faster than speech.