See InterfaceBuilder for the current implementation for MacOsx.

''There's some nice material on this subject on the VisualProgramming page.''

''Oh, yeah! That stuff is lot more detailed. This is just a kind of summary or precis.''

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Look, VisualProgramming does not have much to do with an InterfaceBuilder. Usually an
InterfaceBuilder is being used as a drawing tool for the GUI interface elements.
The programming logic is done separately from that.

In a VisualProgramming environment the programs a written with a graphical tool and have a graphical representation (Prograph, etc.).

''No, you don't understand. I mean, the page VisualProgramming has some nice material '''on the Next Interface Builder in particular''', and therefore anyone looking at the current page might well be interested in that other page. You should move your argument over to that page, if anywhere.''

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I'll try.

NeXT programs are almost always written in ObjectiveCee.
You start to write your applications by including or writing your own components, which
can respond to various messages.

When it comes to the UI, the NextInterfaceBuilder lets you plop down visual components
on a form (ala VB and the rest) and connect them ''visually'' with components you've produced or included
by drawing lines that attach messages from the UI component to receptors(?) on your
projects components, or messages from your components to the UI components receptors.

Very cool stuff at the time. Totally wow'ed me.

Too bad it didn't catch on. 

The idea of cleanly separating application from interface was (and still is) a goal to be aspired to.

'''My Authority for producing this page:'''
I had access (it sat on my desk) to a NeXT machine for about two weeks.
During that time I fiddled with stuff and poked around, and, as usual,
broke it badly enough to have to reinstall the OS.

I looked at and built some of the example programs.
NeXT, I wrote some of my own--all toys. --BobBockholt

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The InterfaceBuilder was originally written in Lisp and ran on a Mac. Really.
Developed by a french guy. Jobs saw it and hired him for NeXT.

Now the InterfaceBuilder is part of the development tools for Mac OS X.

From Brad Myers "A Brief History of Human Computer Interaction Technology"

"JeanMarieHullot created "SOS Interface" in Lisp for the Macintosh while working at INRIA (1984, funded by the French government) which was the first modern 'interface builder'. Hullot built this into a commercial product in 1986 and then went to work for NeXT and created the NeXT Interface Builder (1988), which popularized this type of tool."
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CategoryUserInterface CategoryIde? CategorySoftwareTool