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ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

vipercard.net

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Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#71

Post by tluyben2 »

moltensyntax wrote: post #32
tomcam wrote: post #27

www.livecode.com is a cross platform updated Hypercard descendant. Their free Community edition is GPL

I liked Runtime Revolution. I wish the broader coding community would taken environments like this more seriously, is the text editor sacred? I left the platform before they added more mobile+online support, I'll have to see what they have added recently.

Livecode is great for creating tools on most platforms very fast. Literally a few hours to create quite functional frontends to commandline applications for instance. The batteries included way of working is breath of fresh air compared to what other environments have, but the reach of the platform seems limited. Mostly because to make applications actually release ready for ‘the world’ takes insane amounts of effort. However that does not diminish the power of the system for me; being able to whip up prototypes and ‘good enough’ helper/tool applications is something I only know from Tcl/Tk (especially with Visual tcl). Delphi/VB are fast but not as fast as these. I create mostly write-only software with it but for what I need it for, it is good and I do not know anything that matches that kind of productivity.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#72

Post by misterdata »

dangoor wrote: post #16

This is cool, but I wonder if anyone has made a modern, browser-based variation of HyperCard? Something with a model akin to HyperCard's but exporting stacks in a form that can be easily put onto a page. There's Amber Smalltalk, but that's more powerful and the simplicity of HyperCard is part of its charm.

I did, still a WIP: https://dialogiconderzoek.nl/designer/demo.html

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#73

Post by mmjaa »

ashleyn wrote: post #23

HyperCard together with Qbasic both fell into that forgotten realm of democratising programming; making it so that even your aunt could write a simple program herself. A lot of people ended up learning programming because of these simple languages/tools, and I used to love playing with their projects I'd download from Geocities and the like. It's a bit of a shame the industry gave up on the idea, and abandoned these…

> forgotten realm of democratising programming

This phrase reminded me of a thought I once had, that the removal of the compiler as a first-class application in user-centric OS distributions was an imperial gesture to enforce class hierarchies among end-users: you were either a user, incapable of making your computer do new things, or you are a developer, who must be convinced to make computers do new things using rules and policies (and tools) that were forced upon you by the Powers That Be™.

I think one thing we should be demanding, as computer power users/developers, is the return of software development tools to the forefront of the computing experience. It is unacceptable that computers are being shipped today without the means of making them productive, other than participation in a walled garden.

I know its a tall order, but I'd love to see an OS vendor make a serious point of making their users better developers, not worse.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#74

Post by nailer »

mmjaa wrote: post #73
ashleyn wrote: post #23

HyperCard together with Qbasic both fell into that forgotten realm of democratising programming; making it so that even your aunt could write a simple program herself. A lot of people ended up learning programming because of these simple languages/tools, and I used to love playing with their projects I'd download from Geocities and the like. It's a bit of a shame the industry gave up on the idea, and abandoned these…

> forgotten realm of democratising programming This phrase reminded me of a thought I once had, that the removal of the compiler as a first-class application in user-centric OS distributions was an imperial gesture to enforce class hierarchies among end-users: you were either a user, incapable of making your computer do new things, or you are a developer, who must be convinced to make computers do new things using ru…

I'd like to see development democratised as well, but I think the reason for the change is that not expecting users to be developers made software easier.

Not just the failure of desktop Linux, but also Windows, which still asks regular users if they want to 'debug' a crashing app. To most people, 'debug' means 'fix' and the button just doesn't work.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#76

Post by gregknicholson »

ashleyn wrote: post #23

HyperCard together with Qbasic both fell into that forgotten realm of democratising programming; making it so that even your aunt could write a simple program herself. A lot of people ended up learning programming because of these simple languages/tools, and I used to love playing with their projects I'd download from Geocities and the like. It's a bit of a shame the industry gave up on the idea, and abandoned these…

> even your aunt

I think you may be making a couple of unsavoury assumptions there.

> A lot of people ended up learning programming because of these simple languages/tools, and I used to love playing with their projects I'd download from Geocities and the like.

But I do agree wholeheartedly with your point. I'd love to see more people embrace hackability over shininess, and become more than just consumers again.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#77

Post by mmjaa »

nailer wrote: post #74
mmjaa wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> forgotten realm of democratising programming This phrase reminded me of a thought I once had, that the removal of the compiler as a first-class application in user-centric OS distributions was an imperial gesture to enforce class hierarchies among end-users: you were either a user, incapable of making your computer do new things, or you are a developer, who must be convinced to make computers do new things using ru…

I'd like to see development democratised as well, but I think the reason for the change is that not expecting users to be developers made software easier. Not just the failure of desktop Linux, but also Windows, which still asks regular users if they want to 'debug' a crashing app. To most people, 'debug' means 'fix' and the button just doesn't work.

It is going to require a shift in perspective to make headway on this issue, I feel. I don't really see it happening except perhaps with some of the more cocktail Linux distros... but honestly, I think that a lot of it has to do with the quality of the tooling. Users don't have time for error messages or debug buttons. Developers barely even do, also.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#78

Post by JulianMorrison »

schoen wrote: post #41
ashleyn wrote: post #23

HyperCard together with Qbasic both fell into that forgotten realm of democratising programming; making it so that even your aunt could write a simple program herself. A lot of people ended up learning programming because of these simple languages/tools, and I used to love playing with their projects I'd download from Geocities and the like. It's a bit of a shame the industry gave up on the idea, and abandoned these…

People have written a lot about programming languages that try to use natural-language syntax, but one idea that I remember is that both HyperTalk and AppleScript are a lot easier to read than to write , because you can relatively easily use your knowledge of English to understand what the code is doing, but you can't easily use your knowledge of English to figure out how to phrase instructions in a way that the inte…

Inform 7 ( http://inform7.com/ ) is a modern programming language with "English like" syntax. And as someone who's tried to work from their manual (it has only "shallow end" and "learn by example" formulations) when you actually want to do the thing, one particular English-like construction will compile and a very similar English-like construction will be rejected and it's awfully hard, except by repetition, to learn which one will work.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#79

Post by gm-conspiracy »

buserror wrote: post #69

In 88 (I was 19) I was a 'professional mac developer' and wrote a stack in hypercard to convert huge list of points to polygons, and split them with other polygons. The project was to split the parcels of land from Lille to Paris with the track of the TGV (high speed train) to calculate the expropriation the state was doing to the poor guys who'd end up getting their huge field cut in two, and would have to drive 20…

...and Myst.

Re: ViperCard – An open source re-creation and re-imagination of HyperCard

#80

Post by gm-conspiracy »

mikekchar wrote: post #19
kbutler wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having made extensive use of amber and green and b&w monitors, I much prefer full color. Though I dislike the recent low-contrast efforts. Keep high contrast, reduce brightness as desired for your environment.

I totally agree with this. I've spent hours and hours selecting colour palettes that give high contrast (I work on 16 colour terminals because more than 16 colours makes it really difficult to guarantee good contrast in all situations). Having said that, it's hard to beat black on white for contrast ;-) However, I think one of the reasons people like the monochromatic themes (especially white on black) is the same --…

I just thought you had a fondness for EGA.
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