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\F1\CJune 20, 1981










Dr. Carl Roetter
Bell & Howell, Dept. 8551
7100 N. McCormick Rd.
Chicago, Il 60645



Dear Dr. Roetter:

\JI enjoyed our conversation last week; I do hope  we can come to some
mutually beneficial arrangement. I am enclosing a collection of documents
that may help you understand my position
 and help you formulate your decision. Since those documents
are rather massive, the intent of
the body of this letter is to put that collection of
information in perspective.

The first paper, \F3The Bankruptcy of Basic\F1, is about a year old and
reflects my contention that we can use computational notions directly
in traditional disciplines to bring new light to the understanding of mathematics 
 in this case. In particular, the computational notions that underlie
 schemes for evaluation of polynomials in high school algebra, can be
immediately utilized in a computing environment. Given familiarity with the
computational ideas, one can then  abstract to the notions of functionality, or
abstract to  notions of non-numerical computation.
The former leads to mathematics; the latter leads to computer science.

The second paper, \F3A View of LISP ...\F1, is a further elaboration of
these ideas, coming out of  courses of functional programming and artificial
intelligence, that I taught at Santa Clara University. These were graduate
classes --good places to debug ideas. This paper made up the body of a five-hour
marathon tutorial that I gave at the West Coast Computer Faire last April.
The experience was astounding: about two-hundred people stayed five hours
for what was to be a three-hour tutorial! \F3View\F1 goes from basic computational
notions to advanced AI systems, and though the paper is rough and a bit too "cute"
it worked very well.

A much elaborated  and refined \F3View\F1 formed the backbone of the first 
undergraduate
course at Santa Clara University: \F3EECS 129 --The Art of Computer Science\F1.
This course --upper division, but without computing prerequisite-- drew
students from English, Anthropology, and Biology, as well as Mathematics
and Computer Science. We included an Interactive Programming Laboratory --a 
necessary component, in my opinion, for effective software understanding;
the lab utilized a pre-release of the  MIT Apple LOGO. 
I used  LOGO to motivate the notions of LISP and high-level
interpreter construction: how does LOGO work; and to
motivate Smalltalk and message passing: how do you generalize the turtle idea.
See the extended course outline in \F3Rationale\F1 for more details.

I   expected to
use my company's LISP for Z-80's, but I couldn't afford  the hardware
to upgrade the Apples with Z-80 cards. The closest we got to Smalltalk was 
and early set of the Smalltalk-80 papers and a demo of  Xerox PARC's
Notetaker. Even so, the class members were in a good position to understand the
LISP and Smalltalk notions.

I was reasonably pleased with this  first attempt at the
course; my main concerns are the lack of sufficient hardware for the
lab, and the fluid state of the course material. Though \F3View\F1 formed
a reasonable basis, it was by no means sufficient to sustain the course.
Many areas had to be expanded; my conceptions changed; and new material (like
the Smalltalk-80 papers) had to be integrated. However favorable word 
about the course has spread; professors at Berkeley, MIT, 
Stanford, San Jose State, San Francisco
State, UC Santa Cruz, University of Texas, and 
even the Australian National University
are following its progress; San Jose State and San Francisco
State will offer versions of this course as soon 
as I'm ready to release it. This interest
and support is quite encouraging; it is all without any attempt
to publicize the course or its availablity, for the course needs more work
before it's ready to export. What it needs is time for me to get the 
course text and the laboratory manual in shape; what it needs is
a more substantial collection of hardware --the Apples were borrowed
on a very limited basis from San Jose State.

I had great hopes that the  necessary polishing would occur this summer:
I had proposed a summer faculty workshop at Santa Clara to develop a general
humanities version of this course; this workshop would make up the "computer
literacy"  course for the university. 
This proposal, one of the enclosed documents,  was accepted by the
Dean of the Humanities School and the program was  supported by the President
of the University.  A few months ago, they decided to  move directly
to a fall undergraduate  program without the summer workshop. After a bit
of scurrying around, I produced the  \F3Computing and Culture\F1
paper, outlining a  course for the fall. This outline developed out of
the \F3Art of Computer Science\F1 course, with more stress on the implications
of computation, and less emphasis on the technological  details.
But note that the content is \F2not\F1 a typical "literacy" offering; I believe
that one can deal honestly and effectively with "difficult" notions --\F3Godel,
Escher Bach\F1 shows that.
Indeed,
such an approach is  particularly necessary to make a lasting and valid
course in an area that changes as rapidly computing technology.
Knowledge of "a little Basic and a little word-processing" is \F2not\F1
literacy; it's disaster! I was most pleased to see that Santa Clara University
agrees.

Then disaster struck: the University decided to re-organize the Arts and
Sciences schools, combining them into a joint school. As a result, the
decisions about the course will have to be re-studied  with at least a 
two-term hiatus: the course is frozen, the funds are frozen. Since don't
want to lose the momentum in the development of the course, I have talked
with people at other Universities. The most likely prospect for
an immediate continuation is San Jose State; however their 
most pressing problem is financing the arrangement. Staffing and financing
this operation on such short notice is beyond the budget of the school
and far beyond the budget of my small company. 

So in recent weeks
I have been frantically pursuing alternative funds so that this project
will not have to languish. The immediate outcome from this project will be
two books: a course text, stressing the fundamental principles
--as I mentioned on the phone, a cross between \F3Mindstorms\F1 and
\F3Godel, Escher, Bach\F1--, and a
laboratory text that will relate the course materials to the technological
tools that currently embody the ideas. I also expect to develop software aids:
interactive course material to aid in the understanding of LOGO, LISP, and
perhaps Smalltalk when it becomes available. The form of this interactive
assistance will be simple and direct to begin with, but I forsee AI techniques
--expert systems-- playing a substantial role in tutoring as the new, larger
machines become cost-effective in  the educational areas.

Furthermore, given the kind of hardware that these interactive notions
demand, one can develop some rather nice educational applications. 
Since you mentioned the problems of proprietary  information, I will
refrain from discussing them further; I only raise the issue to  let you know
that I am planning beyond the areas
of mathematics, computer science, and  computer literacy.

I am planning for high schools as well as universities. I'm afraid I feel
that the real damage is done much before one gets to college;
from all reports, the LOGO people have a chance to influence the younger 
minds; I feel that the  approach I'm developing in the Santa Clara
Valley offers similar hope to the post-LOGO generations. Several LOGO  people,
including Marvin Minsky, concur.

I hope this letter and the enclosed documents give you a better picture of
my plans and situation: I am working on a shoestring, but getting results;
to make a real impact I need support. I hope Bell&Howell can help.
Of course, if you'd like any further information, please call or write.
\.
\←L\→S\←R\-L\/'2;\+L\→L

Yours sincerely,


John R. Allen
18215 Bayview Dr.
Los Gatos Ca, 95030
(408) 353-2227, The Lisp Company
(408) 353-3857, home

\←S\→L

Enc:	The Bankruptcy of Basic
	A View of LISP ...
	Duck Soup ...
	EECS129 poster
	A Proposal ...
	A Rationale ...
	Resume