Mindstorms
Alan Kay & Smalltalk

Alan Kay

b. 1940 ·Computer scientist

Led Smalltalk and the Dynabook; gave object-oriented programming its original, radical meaning.

Alan Kay is an American computer scientist whose vision shaped personal computing. At Xerox PARC in the 1970s he led the team that created Smalltalk and, with it, gave object-oriented programming its original radical meaning: autonomous objects that hide their state and communicate only by sending messages.

Years earlier he had sketched the Dynabook, a notebook-sized personal computer "for children of all ages" — a description the world's tablets still haven't fully lived up to. Kay insists the real revolution, computing as a literacy-grade medium for thought, hasn't happened yet. Explore Alan Kay & Smalltalk.

Related ideas

Late bindingDeferring decisions — about types, meanings, even code — to the last possible moment, so systems stay malleable.Message passingComputation as independent objects sending messages to each other — the core of Alan Kay's idea of objects.Object-oriented programmingA style of programming built from objects — but, in its original sense, really about messaging and late binding.The DynabookAlan Kay's 1972 vision of a personal, dynamic computer-as-medium for children of all ages.

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