<P> The Blit, a graphics terminal, was developed at Bell Labs in 1982 . </P> <P> Lisp machines originally developed at MIT and later commercialized by Symbolics and other manufacturers, were early high - end single user computer workstations with advanced graphical user interfaces, windowing, and mouse as an input device . First workstations from Symbolics came to market in 1981, with more advanced designs in the subsequent years . </P> <P> Beginning in 1979, started by Steve Jobs and led by Jef Raskin, the Apple Lisa and Macintosh teams at Apple Computer (which included former members of the Xerox PARC group) continued to develop such ideas . The Lisa, released in 1983, featured a high - resolution stationery - based (document - centric) graphical interface atop an advanced hard disk based OS that featured such things as preemptive multitasking and graphically oriented inter-process communication . The comparatively simplified Macintosh, released in 1984 and designed to be lower in cost, was the first commercially successful product to use a multi-panel window interface . A desktop metaphor was used, in which files looked like pieces of paper . File directories looked like file folders . There were a set of desk accessories like a calculator, notepad, and alarm clock that the user could place around the screen as desired; and the user could delete files and folders by dragging them to a trash - can icon on the screen . The Macintosh, in contrast to the Lisa, used a program - centric rather than document - centric design . Apple revisited the document - centric design, in a limited manner, much later with OpenDoc . </P> <P> There is still some controversy over the amount of influence that Xerox's PARC work, as opposed to previous academic research, had on the GUIs of the Apple Lisa and Macintosh, but it is clear that the influence was extensive, because first versions of Lisa GUIs even lacked icons . These prototype GUIs are at least mouse - driven, but completely ignored the WIMP ("window, icon, menu, pointing device") concept . Screenshots of first GUIs of Apple Lisa prototypes show the early designs . Note also that Apple engineers visited the PARC facilities (Apple secured the rights for the visit by compensating Xerox with a pre-IPO purchase of Apple stock) and a number of PARC employees subsequently moved to Apple to work on the Lisa and Macintosh GUI . However, the Apple work extended PARC's considerably, adding manipulatable icons, and drag and drop manipulation of objects in the file system (see Macintosh Finder) for example . A list of the improvements made by Apple, beyond the PARC interface, can be read at Folklore.org . Jef Raskin warns that many of the reported facts in the history of the PARC and Macintosh development are inaccurate, distorted or even fabricated, due to the lack of usage by historians of direct primary sources . </P>

First apple computer to use graphical user interface