AT PARC Alan Kay uses Smalltalk in an educational context. Alan Kay also proposes they build a portable personal computer, called the Dynabook, the size of an ordinary notebook. PARC management does not support it.

Xerox PARC engineers Chuck Thacker and Butler Lampson ask Alan Kay if they could try building the Dynabook. (They proceed, but the result is the Alto, a large desktop workstation.) Xerox decides to build a personal computer to be used for research. Project "Alto" begins.