Tim Berners-Lee

Date: February 6, 1997, updated 9/97



Up to Design Issues

Web Architecture: 5

See also ComNet 97 talk.

Cleaning up the User Interface

Tim BL 6 Feb 97

We can talk in the abstract about the sorts of things we'd like to do, but it is a wise thought experiment, to imagine how the user interface to a more powerful Web would be. So here is a an attempt to do that thought experiment. There are no screen mockups -- as I said, you have to use your imagination.  


First of, all, the interface to a universal space should have a certain universal consistency. Currently, the user interface yu see on your PC or Mac has a few unfortunate inconsistencies which make it more difficult to use, and less powerful. One is that the "desktop" interface to the file system is different from the "browser". (See talk at Boston Web Conference WWW4, Dec 1995). It is crazy, if you think about it, that the whole screen is use to represent the information which happens to be on your local file system, using the metaphors of folders, while one window is used to represent the information in the rest of the world, using the metaphor of hypertext. What's the difference between hypertext and a desktop anyway? You can double click on things you find in either. Why can't I put folders into my hypertext documents? Why can't I write on the desk? Folders should be just another sort of document. My home page could be one, or it could be a hypertext document. The concepts of "folder" and "document" could be extended until they were the same, but I don't think that that would be necessarily a good idea. It's OK to have differet forms of object for distinctly different uses.

Location fixation

The only fundamental difference between a hypertext document and a folder is that there is a special relationship between any document and the folder where is "is". Unix allows a file to be in more than one directory (with hard links) provided they are on the same disk. DOS requires a file to be in just one directory, which again must be on the same disk. Users should not have to worry about what disks files are on. Suppose the system just files everything under its creator an d its creation date, and the rest of the system is just pointers (soft links, hypertext links, shortcuts), Then a folder becomes a useful sort of document for helping us organize things, but not a container with implications on physical storage. The relationship between a folder and a file in it becomes just a hypertext link. Ah, consistency!

Protocol - Smotocol

Another inconsistency is the current strange division between mail, browser, and news reader tools. Each have editors. The editors are in some cases plain text, and in some cases fancier things such as HTML. On the Internet, a mail agent allows you to use the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, a news agent allows you to use the Network News Transfer Protocol, and a web editor allows you to use the Hypertext Transfer Protocol. This is of course totally meaningless to a user. From the user's point of view, the mail program allows you to move data between mailboxes (folders by any other name) and also allows you to link it into someone else's "In" box. I say "link" as it creates the relationship "this message (file by any other name) is in this mailbox (folder)", which we said above should be a link.

A news editor allows you to link a news document to a widely visible group (box, folder by any other name) which is visible to people all over the world. Functionally, it is very like mailing something to a list of people, as it creates links to the document from groups in each of their news readers.

A web editor allows you to upload a document into a web server, though the way in which you do that varies. (The original meaning of the HTTP "put" operation was to have been a very equivalent "make new document and make link from this" operation.)

Now suppose you want to create a bit of information and you want to link it from a few individual's "in" boxes, a few news groups and a few hypertext documents. You also want it to show up in various folders. Which application should you use?

Clearly, this is a choice which the user should not have to make. Conceptually, a number of links are being made. In practice, various protocols will be used by the system. In the future, combined protocols may exist which efficiently perform all these functions as appropriate. Let's not bother the user with this. When I create an object, I want to pick the type of object I am creating. I also think it is reasonable, if anyone else is going to have access to the object, for me to specify the access list and the distribution terms: I am controlling my new intellectual property. It is also useful for me to specify what sort of quality of storage I want for the document. Do I want it archived reliably for posterity? Do I want it instantly available very rapidly and reliably? The answers to these questions will determine where the system will store my data. The last thing I want to be asked is the filename.

The "save as" filename dialog box is one of the things currently holding up our civilization. It doesn't ask the right information from the user. It asks it not when you are creating the document (and thinking about it at that high level) but when you have finished and are about to do (and thinking about) something else. [See Cooper on this]. As you move information from your head into a computer, everything can be intuitive until this step asks you to think of the disks and the operating system.

Creators of documents should be able to specify
  • Access lists and distribution terms
  • Quality of storage

Of course, I won't want to be negotiating each of these parameters every time I create a new object, so probably I will have a set of templates, standard genres of document, for which these things have been set. In the case of HTML files, I will probably want to associate a default content and a default style sheet with each template. This will make it easier for me and for my readers to get an intuitive feel for the access and archival status of documents at a glance.

I will get back a URI from this operation. The quality of storage is part of the agreement between me, as a creator of an object, and the service I use to create and support that URI.

Sure, people like to pick URIs so that they can be mnemonic. I don't mind that. The problem is when the URIs are picked so that it is difficult to support them in the future. (See the section on naming, and HTTP PUT).

Let's assume that this inconsistency will be dealt with in future.

Signing: From Documents to Deeds

So the consistent user interface we have so far is one in which we are at home with documents and links, and we communicate by massaging the documents and the links.  The whole thing is "quasi-static" -- at any one time you can believe you understand a part of it.  It has state. When you change its state you can see what you are doing.

That's not enough.  It's not enough because in this model everything is malleable: every document is a "living" document. Everything can change.  This is great for an encyclopaedia but its no good for a check book.  It contains description, but because action is represented only in the limited constrained form to those actions which can be viewed as changes of state, there are things we just can't do. We can do idempotent actions -- those which are just as good if you do them twice as if you do them once.  This doesn't work for paying bills.

We can introduce actions which count (or if you like, "actions which you can count") in two ways which boil down to the same thing.  One way is for us to enrich the concept of operations on the net from "GET", "PUT" and "LINK" to a whole plethora of different functions.  We would probably divide were sources by their object "class", which would define what set of operations are available for each resource. This is the familiar world of distributed object oriented programming.

The second way is that we would allow, in the user interface, documents to be signed.  A signature on paper is a special thing (in principle).  It is a countable operation.  You make a signature on the document and it becomes something different.  No longer duplicatable at will, you act of signing is caught -- and you can be held to it.  The document becomes something which has been done: a deed. This is the familiar world of legal process.  On the web, it happens when you press a "submit" button and your order is submitted to the mail order company. When you make a document into a deed, it freezes.  You can't change deeds.  You can revoke them or cancel them out with other deeds, but you can't change one. Deeds are not living documents.  In fact, lots of documents are in practice frozen in that they aren't going to change much.  But they may not be deeds: noone has explicitly made an action on them.  

The two forms are equivalent, as when you make a deed, you can in the document write the name and parameters of any function you want executed, and submit it to a remote operation agent. Similarly, whenever a remote non-idempotent  operation is made using some Remote Procedure Call protocol, in practice the protocol involves making some message up containing the parameters, and directly or indirectly putting on it some sequence number or identifier to prevent it from being accidentally operated on twice.  Both are abstract representations of a commitment, and action which counts.

As we're talking about user interface here, I'd like to see a clean interface for making a deed, which makes it quite clear to me that I am committing something, and not just doing another search.  I suppose I have a set of "rubber stamp" icons which leave a name/date stamp on a document.  Different stamps can be made with different levels of security.  They may represent actions by different people, different roles, with different levels of authority.  I guess I'd have one for stamping W3C Recommendations which have been though the process, and a totally different one for ordering medium sized purchases on my credit card.

Deeds don't have to be signed digitally (but it helps).  Every time you press "send" in your email you are making a deed. The document freezes.  You may even be digitally signing it. You lose control -- you can't take it back.  

Socially, we will have to accept electreonic deeds. Also, we will have to define the limits of commitment which someone can imply by changing living documents without explicitly making a deed.


The "Oh yeah?" button

See also WWW4 Boston talk.

Deeds are ways we tell the computer, the system, other people,  the Web, to trust something. How does the Web tell us?

It can happen in lots of ways but again it needs a clear user interface.  It's no good for one's computer to be aware of the lack of security about a document if the user can ignore it. But then, most of the time as user I want to concentrate on the content not on the metadata: so I don't want the security to be too intrusive. The machine can check back the reasons why it might trust a document automatically or when asked. Here is just one way I could accept it.

At the toolbar (menu, whatever) associated with a document there is a button marked "Oh, yeah?".  You press it when you loses that feeling of trust.  It says to the Web, "so how do I know I can trust this information?". The software then goes directly or indirectly back to metainformation about the document, which suggests a number of reasons. These are like incomplete logiocal proofs. One might say,

"This offer for sale is signed with a key mentioned in a list of keys (linked) which asserts that tthe Internet Consumers Association endoses it as reputable for consumer trade in 1997 for transactions up to up to $5000. The list is signed with key (value) which you may trust as an authority for such statements."

Your computer fetches the list and verifies the signature because it has found in a personal statement that you trust the given key as being valid for such statements. That is, you have said, or whoever your trusted to set up your profile said,

"Key (value) is good for verification of any statement of the form `the Internet Consumers Association endoses page(p) as reputable for consumer trade in 1997 for transactions up to up to $5000. '"

and you have also said that

"I trust for purchases up to $3000 any page(p) for which `the Internet Consumers Association endoses page(p) as reputable for consumer trade in 1997 for transactions up to up to $5000."

The result of pressing on the "Oh, yeah?" button is either a list of assumptions on whcih the trust is based, or of course an error message indicating either that a signature has failed, or that the system couldn't find a path of trust from you to the page.

Notice that to do this, we do not need a system which can derive a proof or disproof of any arbitrary logical assertion. The client will be helped by the server, in that the server will have an incentive to send a suggested proof or set opf possible proof paths.  Therefore it won't be necessry for the client to search all over the web for the path.

The "Oh, yeah?" button is in fact the realively easy bit of human interface. Allowing the user to make statements above and understand them is much more difficult. About as difficult as programming a VCR clock: too difficult. So I imagine that the subset of the logic language which is offered to most users will be simple: certainly not Turing complete!

Programming the space: Macros by example.

@@@ TBD

Specific notes on Windows UI and Typical Web browsers


The gist of it is the need for greater consistency in the UI and the underlying system.


Some basic principles:

1. Anything of any value and persistence must have a URI so that it can be referenced (yes, I know Microsoft have a Moniker scheme but now it has to be URIs to go global).

2. Any place I can use a URI I can use any URI.

3. Links are an evident as a primary user interface metaphor, with a consistent drag/drop or control/drag/drop for link creation, and consistent ways of viewing by link type.

4. The system should generate persistent URIs wherever possible. These can be just URLs in file or http space but they should not change. This is a longer term thing.

5. Things like start menus, bookmarks, favorites, recent document lists, toolbars, should be viewable as discreet objects in familiar ways. A Good Thing is the ability to easily see and manipulate the start menu in Explorer (right click Start). A Bad Thing is a modeful "organize favorites" dialog box is the most inconsistent outdated constraining way of moving things around I have seen in a while.  A modeless "Goto bookmarks" is better, but

I propose that any set or hierarchical structure should have a consistent windows explorer interface. You clearly feel that anything which is a set can also have an HTML view. In that case, I want HTML views of everything. Look at al the containers we have:

These must have consistent interfaces.

Some of these we can do without. Favorites, most of the Start Menu, and mailboxes are all ways of classifying things. They should all basically have the same interface and frankly I don't see the need for them being different. I want to put my inbox in my start menu. I want to be able to chose whether something I put in a menu is terminal or expanded. In general. (I could always put a link to the Favorites folder into the start menu but it wouldn't be expanded as a menu. I'd like general control over menus.

(Examples of things I want to do: Bookmark mail messages of interest, indeed any object.  Save a web page in a mailbox (which would freeze it in the cache and keep a pointer to it)



Dialog boxes are as we really know bad UI. The "Save As" and "Open" dialog boxes are a pain (I always want to be able to delete and rename files in them) because the are constraining and inconsistent, and they block until you get out. I'd be happy for an open box to simply launch an explorer window or select a current one, while providing a receptacle for icons which are to be opened. I'd like that receptacle (which is just the application icon) to be a URI I can save in any of the containers above.

The history list should of course be a something which works across all applications. A time-based view is a neat history lis, but it should apply across everything I have done in any applicationt. Make it generic so it works on any object. Make the index of everything I have done (maybe my whole click stream) be available as such an object, to be viewed just like a mailbox. I should even be able to make a link into it.

Maito: addresses

A mailto address is a misnomer (my fault I feel as I didn't think when we created it) as it is not supposed to be a verb "start a mail message to this person", it is supposed to be a reference to a web object, a mailbox. So clicking on a link to it should bring up a representation of the mailbox. This for example might include (subject to my preferences) an address book entry and a list of the messages sent to/from [Cc] the person recently to my knowledge. Then I could mail something to someone by linking (dragging) the mailbox icon to or from the document icon.

Modularity: MIME types and Operations

The OS as a concept  is currently having trouble with modularity -- the module used to be an application which provided its own communication and document types. Now the MIME types are orthogonal. I see new applications as either producing new mime type support or new link functionality (or both) but separably.

I should be able to mail anything. Suppose I am editing a photo. The tool bars are photo editing toolbars. WhenI want to mail it, I find the person I want to mail it to (any way: not from an adders book forcibly -- I can put my friends in my start menu or anywhere or of course find them on the web). I drag the document onto the person icon. Now that relationship gives me a choice (To, Cc, etc), and I will now get an extra toolbar for controlling the mail options. If I drag it to a newsgroup, the functionality will be exactly the same though the options may be different. I can then the links from the message by type (To, Cc, newsgroup, embedded hypertext link, version info, etc etc) in a consistent way. I regard dragging the icon of the document to a folder as being making a link too. The system should stop regarding folders as where things are stored. That has got to be decoupled, to separate the logical thing (I classify this as important travel) from the physical thing (I put this on drive C:). That is going to be a steady change, but early simple steps are

When I hit "Send" or "Commit", then the document is frozen, and the  mail engines and NNTP software [and version control software]  starts to actual implement the links, and the web server allows appropriate access. All this is under the hood, which you can lift to see how its getting on if you like.

Archival and Access levels

This storage quality is a common parameter which I want to be able to change for anything. For example, I may decide that a web page or a newsgroup article I want to have on a "personal archive" availability. S I just change it with a menu item. No "Save As". No filenames. It has a URI already. And then I  know it will always be available to me on my desktop and laptop. Just like that.

The two toolbars of persistence level (think of name for that) and  access level are so important they deserve space maybe in that space to the R of the menu bar, or in window title banner. At least in icon form. I don't expect to have many combinations of them once I have customized the combinations I need with the archive and access wizard.

The archive status includes important flags for disconnected working -- is this object to be replicated and if so how often, etc.

Disconnected operation

The system has got toknow what its connectivity is at any time. Without a reboot! I would like this to be a switch available across the board, switching IPs and diconnected operation.

Up to Design Issues; On to Editing interfaces

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