The Register comments in more detail of Apple’s patented Piles User Interface.
Tagged as the next generation User Interface (UI) and designed to replace the windows/folders metaphor which apple designed back in 1981. Piles focuses more on the semantic meaning of how data is organised, stored and searched rather than the familar grouping by files and folders.
Piles was developed by Gitta Salomon and her colleagues at Apple’s Advanced Technology Human Interface Group and was announced to the world at the CHI conference in May 1992.
Piles is rumoured to be used for the first time in the forthcoming version of Apple OS X 10.3 operating system.