

Alas, HyperCard (1998) - jawngee
http://db.tidbits.com/article/5155

======
thaumaturgy
I have to credit HyperCard/HyperTalk with giving me my start in programming.
Although I started programming in BASIC on a Commodore setup at a pretty young
age, it was HyperCard along about the seventh grade that got me thinking about
more complex concepts.

When I was a high school freshman about 17 years ago (yuk), I wrote a
complicated self-modifying program in HyperCard. I wanted to write a program
that could understand human sentences and reply accordingly, and figured that
self-modifying code would be the best way to go about that. Of course it never
quite succeeded, but the program was stable and could run for a very long
time, and gradually improve. Debugging it was a real adventure.

There was a way to add 'external resources' to HyperCard stacks, and then call
them from HyperTalk. I can't remember what they were called now, but there
were 'functions' and 'procedures' I think. With those, you could get color
working, or do really almost anything on a Mac, all from HyperCard.

They were compiled bits of code, so naturally my interest shifted towards
making those instead. I wanted to try writing my own, instead of browsing
eWorld and the nascent AOL for stuff written by that Peter what's-his-name.

Somewhere I was told that they were written in Pascal, so I got my hands on a
copy of THINK Pascal, and started playing with that. It came with a really
wonderful hyperlinked library of the MacOS toolbox. From there, to C, to
assembly, and on and on.

I still have a real soft spot in my heart for HyperCard. If there were a
modern equivalent, it would be perfect for teaching programming to beginners.

EDIT: I have an idea. If anybody happens to have an old pile of HyperTalk
laying around, please email me. Address is in my profile.

~~~
warwick
I also credit HyperCard for really getting me started. Yeah, I learned a
little BASIC, but I could write real programs in HyperCard. It was amazing and
breathtaking. HyperCard was to the Mac as Applesoft BASIC was to the Apple II.

Since most stacks were interpreted, not compiled, you could just look at the
source. HyperTalk is why I learned how to read code. I still remember when I
finally realized what HyperCard meant when it said 'too much recursion'. It
was like a flashbulb going off in my brain.

The modern equivalent, in terms of 'wow, how do I do that?' is obviously
Javascript, but HyperTalk was just easier to read and get started with.

A minor happy note: iOS autocorrects the capitalization in HyperTalk and
HyperCard. That just made me very happy.

------
gluegadget
Interesting that <http://apple.com/hypercard> gets redirected to wikipedia
article (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HyperCard>).

------
rman666
Doesn't Apple realize they'd hit another big Home Run if they brought
HyperCard back for the iPad, iPhone, & iTouch. It would a huge hit. Well, at
least with me :-)

~~~
asnyder
They already rejected RunRev(<http://www.runrev.com>) for the iPhone and iPad.
The modern day descendant of Hypercard. They have no interest in bringing back
Hypercard.

RunRev's CEO thoughts: [http://www.runrev.com/company/runrev-blog/revmobile-
and-appl...](http://www.runrev.com/company/runrev-blog/revmobile-and-apples-
iphone-sdk-agreement)

------
lkrubner
I first learned programming using Hypercard. This was back in the mid 90s. It
was huge fun. HyperTalk was close to English and was the easiest programming
language I've ever encountered. From HyperTalk I branched out to other script
languages - AppleScript, PHP, Perl. I did all kinds of programming for 10
years, before I began learning "real" languages like Java.

In general, script languages make it easier for people to get started with
programming, but HyperCard was an environment that simplified a great deal. It
was even easier to learn that your average script language. It made
assumptions for you, to help you get started. Yet it was amazing how much you
could do with it.

I think HyperCard got flattened by the Web. I do not think it is coming back.
Nowadays if people want an easy-to-learn environment that allows them to build
a wide range of software, there is the web.

If there is a market niche to be filled, it might be a package that tames the
Web somewhat. The web is a little too wide open, and the beginner is
confronted with a lot of choices before they have the knowledge to make those
choices. HyperCard reduced the number of decisions that you had to make up
front. Yes, there are packages like Dreamweaver and Flash that help with web
and multimedia production, but they do not hold your hand like HyperCard did.
Both of them are for professionals, they are scary if you are first learning.
A package that makes a lot of assumptions for you, to get you started, might
find a niche, even now. And even more so for something like the iPhone, where
it is a little easier to make starting assumptions.

For me, the story of HyperCard is one of missed opportunities. In 1995 I went
to the big tech/photo expo at the Javitts Center in New York City. At the
time, interactive multi-media CD ROMs were suppose to be the next big thing
(there is a scene in Jurassic Park, which came out in 1994, where the young
girl expresses excitement over "an interactive CD ROM". After the web took
off, it was hard to remember why CD ROMs were suppose to be a big deal).
Macromedia was there, promoting Director. I looked at Director, but I was sure
that this niche was going to end up being owned by HyperCard. I felt that
anything so easy to learn was going to get a huge following, and then a lot of
those people would evolve in serious professionals who would use the tool they
were familiar with to keep building stuff (which is what made PHP successful,
just a few years later).

Macromedia adjusted quickly to the Web. They took Director and stripped it
down and came out with a simple product called Flash. Which eventually grew up
to take over the space in exactly the way that I thought HyperCard was going
to do.

Apple had something important in their hands in 1995. But they made bad
decisions. Really, it is remarkable how many bad decisions they made in the
mid 90s.

------
lenni
This article is a great insight about what was hot 12 years ago - a little
time capsule, if you will. The web (or browser to be precise) is mentioned
only in passing; the author could to not have seen that it would be _the_
platform which most of the software innovations (and a significant number of
social ones) in the following decade would rely on.

~~~
flomo
A time capsule into the mind of a 'legacy system' programmer. He's bemoaning
Apple finally dropping the last vaporous attempts to keep Hypercard relevant,
but the market had moved on years earlier.

What was actually hot 12 years ago: Java applets, Macromedia Flash, early
dynamic HTML browsers, web scripting languages (ASP/Perl/etc), dot.com stocks.
People did understand where the future lay.

------
BerislavLopac
For a long time I've had a wonderful HyperCard application (not written by
me), and I've dreamed for years how I would just love to be able to
disassemble it and re-write it in a modern language, like Python.
Unfortunately, I have no idea where to find something to even run it with,
much less look into the internals. Any ideas?

~~~
JadeNB
Others have mentioned RunRev (<http://www.runrev.com>); there's also TileStack
(<http://tilestack.com>). I'm not sure if RunRev will do anything for you, but
TileStack seems to have limited facility to run existing HyperCard code; see
[http://tilestack.com/stacks/?search=%28tags%3Ahypercard%29&#...</a>.

------
scelerat
Just curious -- is there some context to this twelve-year-old story?

I miss Hypercard too, but I had been building stuff on the web for four years
by the time its demise became official.

~~~
commieneko
I don't know what's up, but in the last week I've seen several references to
Hypercard out of the blue. A modern Hypercard for the iPad or iPhone would
rock.

------
pneill
I don't know if many of you have looked closely at Apple's Keynote, but it's a
stones throw from being an update to hypercard. It just needs to add support
for scripting and you're done.

