Sketchpad Demonstration

Ivan Sutherland's doctoral thesis demonstrated Sketchpad, the first interactive computer graphics program. It allowed users to draw and manipulate geometric shapes directly on a CRT screen with a light pen.

Significance

Laid the conceptual groundwork for interactive computer-aided design, showing that computers could be tools for graphical creation and manipulation, not just calculation.

Key facts

Date
1963-01-01
Type
invention
Location
MIT Lincoln Laboratory, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA