WYSIWYG
Adapted from Wikipedia
Table of Contents
Introduction...............................................................................................................2
Meaning....................................................................................................................2
Historical notes.........................................................................................................2
Before WYSIWYG................................................................................................2
Earliest WYSIWYG software................................................................................3
Etymology.............................................................................................................3
Related acronyms....................................................................................................4
Page 2
Introduction
In computing, a WYSIWYG editor is a system in which content (text and graphics)
displayed onscreen during editing appears in a form closely corresponding to its
appearance when printed or displayed as a finished product, which might be a
printed document, web page, or slide presentation. WYSIWYG is an acronym for
"what you see is what you get".
Meaning
WYSIWYG implies a user interface that allows the user to view something very
similar to the end result while the document is being created. In general
WYSIWYG implies the ability to directly manipulate the layout of a document
without having to type or remember names of layout commands.
Applications may offer multiple WYSIWYG modes with different levels of
"realism", including
•
A composition mode, in which the user sees something somewhat similar
to the end result, but with additional information useful while composing,
such as section breaks and non-printing characters, and uses a layout that
is more conducive to composing than to layout.
•
A layout mode, in which the user sees something very similar to the end
result, but with some additional information useful in ensuring that elements
are properly aligned and spaced, such as margin lines.
•
A preview mode, in which the application attempts to present a
representation that is as close to the final result as possible.
Historical notes
Before WYSIWYG
Before the adoption of WYSIWYG techniques, text appeared in editors using the
system standard typeface and style with little indication of layout (margins,
spacing etc.). Users were required to enter special non-printing control codes
(now referred to as markup code tags) to indicate that some text should be in
boldface, italics, or a different typeface or size.
1F (00) Chan Tai Man
Page 3
Earliest WYSIWYG software
Bravo, a document preparation program for the
Alto produced at Xerox PARC by Butler
Lampson, Charles Simonyi and colleagues in
1974, is generally considered the first program
to
incorporate
WYSIWYG
technology,
displaying text with formatting (e.g. with
justification, fonts, and proportional spacing of
characters). The Alto monitor (72 pixels per
inch) was designed so that one full page of text
could be seen and then printed on the first
Illustration
1:
Compound
laser printers. When the text was laid out on document displayed on Xerox
the screen 72 PPI font metric files were used, 8010 Star system
but when printed 300 PPI files were used —
thus one would occasionally find characters and words slightly off, a problem that
continues to this day.
Bravo was never released commercially, but the software eventually included in
the Xerox Star can be seen as a direct descendant of it.
In the 1970s and early 1980s, most popular home computers lacked the
sophisticated graphics capabilities necessary to display WYSIWYG documents,
meaning that such applications were usually confined to limited-purpose, high-end
workstations (such as the IBM Displaywriter System) that were too expensive for
the general public to afford. Towards the mid 1980s, however, things began to
change. Improving technology allowed the production of cheaper bitmapped
displays, and WYSIWYG software started to appear for more popular computers,
including LisaWrite for the Apple Lisa, released in 1983, and MacWrite for the
Apple Macintosh, released in 1984.
Etymology
The phrase was coined in 1982 by Larry Sinclair, an engineer at Triple I
(Information International, Inc.), to express the idea that what the user sees on the
screen is what the user gets on the printer while using the "page layout system", a
pre-press typesetting system first shown at ANPS in Las Vegas.
The phrase was popularised by a newsletter published by Arlene and Jose
Ramos, called WYSIWYG. It was created for the emerging Pre-Press industry
going electronic in the late 1970s. After three years of publishing, the newsletter
was sold to employees at the Stanford Research Institute in California.
1F (00) Chan Tai Man
Page 4
The phrase "What you see is what you get", from which the acronym derives, was
a catchphrase popularized by Flip Wilson's drag persona "Geraldine" (from
Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In in the late 1960s and then on The Flip Wilson Show
until 1974). Geraldine would often say it to excuse her quirky behavior. Jon
Seybold and researchers at PARC were simply reappropriating the popular
cultural reference.
Related acronyms
Many variations are used only to illustrate a point or make a joke, and have very
limited real use. Some that have been proposed include the following:
Acronym
WYSIAYG
WYSIWYM
WYGIWYS
WYSIWYS
WYSIWYW
WISIWIT
Meaning
What you see is all you get, used to point out that advanced users are
sometimes limited by the user interface.
What you see is what you mean (The user sees what best conveys the
message.)
What you get is what you see, used in computing to describe an
interaction paradigm in results-oriented user interface. The term was
used by Jakob Nielsen to describe Microsoft Office 2007's "Ribbon"
interface
What you see is what you sign, an important requirement for digital
signature software. It means that the software has to be able to show
the user the content without any hidden content before the user signs
it.
What you see is what you want, used to describe GNU TeXmacs
editing platform. The abbreviation clarifies that unlike in WYSIWYG
editors, the user is able to customize WYSIWYW platforms to partly
act as manual typesetting programs such as TeX or troff.
What I see is what I type, also used to describe text-oriented editing
systems in the opposite sense of WYSIWYG.
1F (00) Chan Tai Man