Bill Atkinson, Who Made Computers Easier to Use, Is Dead at 74

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Bill Atkinson, Who Made Computers Easier to Use, Is Dead at 74

A designer for Apple, he created software that made it possible to display shapes, images and text on the screen and present a simulated “desktop.”


Bill Atkinson in 1987. Among other things, he is credited with inventing computer screen “pull down” menus and the “double-click” gesture of a mouse. Michel Baret/Gamma-Rapho, via Getty

By John Markoff
June 7, 2025

Bill Atkinson, the Apple Computer designer who created the software that enabled the transformative visual approach pioneered by the company’s Lisa and Macintosh computers, making the machines accessible to millions of users without specialized skills, died on Thursday night at his home in Portola Valley, Calif., in the San Francisco Bay Area. He was 74. … In a Facebook post, his family said the cause was pancreatic cancer.

It was Mr. Atkinson who programmed QuickDraw, a foundational software layer used for both the Lisa and Macintosh computers; composed of a library of small programs, it made it possible to display shapes, text and images on the screen efficiently. … The QuickDraw programs were embedded in the computers’ hardware, providing a distinctive graphical user interface that presented a simulated “desktop,” displaying icons of folders, files and application programs.

Mr. Atkinson is credited with inventing many of the key aspects of graphical computing, such as “pull down” menus and the “double-click” gesture, which allows users to open files, folders and applications by clicking a mouse button twice in succession.

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Mr. Atkinson, left, in January 2024 during an event celebrating the 40th anniversary of the launch of Apple’s Macintosh computer. It was held at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif. With him, from left, were two other Mac creators, Steve Capps and Andy Hertzfeld. Neal Waters/ZUMA Press Wire, via Alamy

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Mr. Atkinson was studying for a Ph.D. in neurobiology at the University of Washington when Mr. Jobs persuaded him to become the 51st employee at Apple. He decided to leave school after Mr. Jobs told him, “Think how fun it is to surf on the front edge of a wave, and how not-fun to dog paddle on the tail edge of the same wave.”

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