One of the Great Research Labs.
Xerox Corporation, about the time they acquired Scientific Data Systems, founded a research laboratory in the hills above Palo Alto, the Palo Alto Research Center. It was only after an elite staff of scientists and engineers had been recruited and assembled at the dedication of the facilities that they were to hear of their mission: invent the paperless office of the future.
It was a good mission, though many thought it off the wall at the time. The group really did invent the office of the future. It just didn't turn out to be paperless.
See Dealers Of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age by Michael Hiltzik.
Also see Fumbling the Future: How Xerox Invented and Then Ignored the First Personal Computer by Douglas K. Smith.
Achievements include but are not limited to:
Most of the GUI idioms that we now take for granted
WYSIWYG proportional-font document editing (please confirm if you are in the know)
Laser printers
Improvements in Ethernet connectivity
Small Talk, essentially the first "dynamic" OOP language
Arguably one of the greatest real-life Dilbertian failures as far as capitalizing on innovation, ranking right up there with the record company that rejected the Beatles because "guitar bands are on their way out".
Old Page (edits July 14, 1995 - March 17, 2001)
See original on c2.com 