5 ms·

Decker – A HyperCard Replacement

191 points by harryvederci 3y ago

jclulow 3y ago
I tried some of the examples on my phone but it ends up being basically microscopic because it's targetting a classic Mac resolution. I think it would help if it either did something intelligent with pixel doubling or some other scaling technique, or at least didn't disable the user's ability to zoom in when it's too small.
- rchaud 3y ago
  In the top menu, you can click Decker > Fullscreen and it will scale to the width of your screen. It's pretty usable in landscape mode.
dang 3y ago
Related: Decker: A Multimedia Sketchpad - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33478246 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33478246 - Nov 2022 (7 comments) Lil: A Scripting Language - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33393283 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33393283 - Oct 2022 (28 comments) Decker, a platform that builds on the legacy of Hypercard and classic macOS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33377964 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33377964 - Oct 2022 (88 comments)
- RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
  Also, Decker: Responding to Responses: https://beyondloom.com/blog/responses.html https://beyondloom.com/blog/responses.html
hyperhello 3y ago
Just to plug my own project here, or maybe for comparison: HyperCard Simulator at https://hcsimulator.com https://hcsimulator.com will import and run your classic HyperCard stacks as faithfully as possible.
- turnsout 3y ago
  This is awesome! Nice job!
- antfarm 3y ago
  Cool! But how is the scrolling supposed to work? I just read through the Seinfeld stack on my iPad (iOS 17, Safari) and the text of some cards was cut off at the bottom with no way to scroll down.
  - hyperhello 3y ago
    If the original stack allowed the field area to scroll it will, but it may not. I tried to get the fonts and sizes to match as well as possible but the Mac text is converted to UTF and is rendered as HTML; i spliced the dinosaur genetics with frog DNA.
- jv22222 3y ago
  https://hcsimulator.com/Pantechnicon/original-collection/ThoruYamamoto-img/A-Little-Tree https://hcsimulator.com/Pantechnicon/original-collection/Tho... Those first years of personal computing inspired so much amazing creativity like this.
richardanaya 3y ago
Beautiful
xhevahir 3y ago
Here's another re-creation of HyperCard, WyldCard: https://github.com/defano/wyldcard https://github.com/defano/wyldcard
hoistbypetard 3y ago
The inclusion of Font/DA Mover when you use the "Resources..." menu item made me chortle with joy.
- RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
  This is one of my favorite gags, so I'm glad at least a few people caught the reference.
  - beagle3 3y ago
    Would you be able to explain it to those of us who did not grow up with Macs at the time?
    - RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
      In early MacOS, fonts and desk accessories (small applications which could run concurrently with a main application in the pre-multifinder era) were resources which lived in the "System" file. An uninstalled font or desk accessory would be stored in the resource fork of a "suitcase", and a utility called the Font/DA Mover offered a simple UI for copying these resources between suitcases and the system file. Decker doesn't use a forked filesystem, but still has "resources" in the form of various disembodied modular pieces that can be copied between decks: fonts, sounds, pattern/color palettes, lil modules, and contraption prototypes. When I designed the UI for managing and importing resources, I modeled it after the Font/DA Mover, and naturally called it the "Font/Deck Accessory Mover". :)
      - beagle3 3y ago
        Thanks!
bane 3y ago
Oh man, there is an absolute beauty with 1-bit graphics that I think is deeply underappreciated. When the right dithering algorithm is used, the graphics look like what characters in cyberpunk novels dream of. [1] I secretly wish the dominant aesthetic in computing was one where everything was mac-like 1-bit dithered graphics, and we only used color when absolutely necessary - when the black and white graphics just couldn't convey what was needed. Like if instead of throwing it away for color, we had just built on top of it. Side note, I'm also often struck how 1-bit-ish graphics sometimes were used to great effect on the ZXSpectrum, another minimally graphically capable computer of the era. When the game developers were trying to use color the games often looked worse than if they had just stuck with a simpler scheme. Chase H.Q., Bombjack, Pang!, etc. all look amazing to my eye. 1 - https://surma.dev/things/ditherpunk/ https://surma.dev/things/ditherpunk/
- ofrzeta 3y ago
  Did you see this year's Chaos Communication Congress videos? They have a nice video intro in 1 bit dithering. Random video (first 10 seconds): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNc8HJEWMtM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNc8HJEWMtM
  - daynthelife 3y ago
    Return of the Obra Dinn is also an amazing game with entirely 1-bit rendering. https://store.steampowered.com/app/653530/Return_of_the_Obra_Dinn/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/653530/Return_of_the_Obra...
tonymet 3y ago
I wish HyperCard would have been the web UI instead of HTML. Simpler, more consistent, more intuitive, fewer distractions.
- noduerme 3y ago
  It (and Director, and Flash - and early javascript) were too hard to index and rank for search. The searchability paradigm crushed the creative paradigm in web, financially around 1999-2004 and ultimately culturally to the extent that the former model is barely remembered.
  - KerrAvon 3y ago
    That’s not why it didn’t happen. The Web took off in 1995; Google was the first really good web search facility, and it arrived in 1998. There were earlier ones (I remember using AltaVista), but generally if you wanted to find things before Google you used either a directory like Yahoo or other web pages to find stuff. We also don’t know what “index and ranking for search” would have looked like in a HyperCard-style web paradigm. Something like Google could work; it would have to be a sophisticated enough to parse stacks instead of HTML, but we’re already deep into an alternate universe, so I’ll stop here. Also, “index and ranking for search” is probably a bad thing. SEO has absolutely destroyed the web.
    - KerrAvon 3y ago
      (I think conflating JavaScript and Flash with HyperCard is a mistake.)
  - marginalia_nu 3y ago
    Doesn't really check with how most modern SPAs flourish despite having basically the same problems as Flash of being incompatible with most web crawlers since more often than not you can't trust what they decide to put in the URL bar (if anything) actually links back to the state that is on screen.
    - 3y ago
WoodenChair 3y ago
Shameless plug: If you're looking to make graphics for 1-bit scenarios like this, I make an app for that called Retro Dither for the Mac: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/retro-dither-b-w-is-beautiful/id1586423971?mt=12 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/retro-dither-b-w-is-beautiful/...
ptek 3y ago
Looks great, Seems like the tool to remake Micro$oft Home - Encarta 95 Mind Maze
beagle3 3y ago
Also includes Lil - a programming language quite different from Hyperscript/Applescript, but which is beautiful and interesting in its own right — kind of a “humanized” vector language.
i_don_t_know 3y ago
The creator of Decker talked about the motivation behind Decker, its design and the design of its scripting language lil on the ArrayCast podcast: https://www.arraycast.com/episodes/episode43-john-earnest-decker https://www.arraycast.com/episodes/episode43-john-earnest-de... Very interesting episode!
qwertyshok 3y ago
Will something ESP32-based be able to run Decker?
- RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
  No.

191 points by harryvederci 3y ago

I tried some of the examples on my phone but it ends up being basically microscopic because it's targetting a classic Mac resolution. I think it would help if it either did something intelligent with pixel doubling or some other scaling technique, or at least didn't disable the user's ability to zoom in when it's too small.

rchaud 3y ago
In the top menu, you can click Decker > Fullscreen and it will scale to the width of your screen. It's pretty usable in landscape mode.

dang 3y ago

Related: Decker: A Multimedia Sketchpad - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33478246 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33478246 - Nov 2022 (7 comments) Lil: A Scripting Language - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33393283 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33393283 - Oct 2022 (28 comments) Decker, a platform that builds on the legacy of Hypercard and classic macOS - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33377964 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33377964 - Oct 2022 (88 comments)

RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
Also, Decker: Responding to Responses: https://beyondloom.com/blog/responses.html https://beyondloom.com/blog/responses.html

hyperhello 3y ago

Just to plug my own project here, or maybe for comparison: HyperCard Simulator at https://hcsimulator.com https://hcsimulator.com will import and run your classic HyperCard stacks as faithfully as possible.

turnsout 3y ago
This is awesome! Nice job!
antfarm 3y ago
Cool! But how is the scrolling supposed to work? I just read through the Seinfeld stack on my iPad (iOS 17, Safari) and the text of some cards was cut off at the bottom with no way to scroll down.
- hyperhello 3y ago
  If the original stack allowed the field area to scroll it will, but it may not. I tried to get the fonts and sizes to match as well as possible but the Mac text is converted to UTF and is rendered as HTML; i spliced the dinosaur genetics with frog DNA.
jv22222 3y ago
https://hcsimulator.com/Pantechnicon/original-collection/ThoruYamamoto-img/A-Little-Tree https://hcsimulator.com/Pantechnicon/original-collection/Tho... Those first years of personal computing inspired so much amazing creativity like this.

richardanaya 3y ago

Beautiful

xhevahir 3y ago

Here's another re-creation of HyperCard, WyldCard: https://github.com/defano/wyldcard https://github.com/defano/wyldcard

hoistbypetard 3y ago

The inclusion of Font/DA Mover when you use the "Resources..." menu item made me chortle with joy.

RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
This is one of my favorite gags, so I'm glad at least a few people caught the reference.
- beagle3 3y ago
  Would you be able to explain it to those of us who did not grow up with Macs at the time?
  - RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
    In early MacOS, fonts and desk accessories (small applications which could run concurrently with a main application in the pre-multifinder era) were resources which lived in the "System" file. An uninstalled font or desk accessory would be stored in the resource fork of a "suitcase", and a utility called the Font/DA Mover offered a simple UI for copying these resources between suitcases and the system file. Decker doesn't use a forked filesystem, but still has "resources" in the form of various disembodied modular pieces that can be copied between decks: fonts, sounds, pattern/color palettes, lil modules, and contraption prototypes. When I designed the UI for managing and importing resources, I modeled it after the Font/DA Mover, and naturally called it the "Font/Deck Accessory Mover". :)
    - beagle3 3y ago
      Thanks!

bane 3y ago

Oh man, there is an absolute beauty with 1-bit graphics that I think is deeply underappreciated. When the right dithering algorithm is used, the graphics look like what characters in cyberpunk novels dream of. [1] I secretly wish the dominant aesthetic in computing was one where everything was mac-like 1-bit dithered graphics, and we only used color when absolutely necessary - when the black and white graphics just couldn't convey what was needed. Like if instead of throwing it away for color, we had just built on top of it. Side note, I'm also often struck how 1-bit-ish graphics sometimes were used to great effect on the ZXSpectrum, another minimally graphically capable computer of the era. When the game developers were trying to use color the games often looked worse than if they had just stuck with a simpler scheme. Chase H.Q., Bombjack, Pang!, etc. all look amazing to my eye. 1 - https://surma.dev/things/ditherpunk/ https://surma.dev/things/ditherpunk/

ofrzeta 3y ago
Did you see this year's Chaos Communication Congress videos? They have a nice video intro in 1 bit dithering. Random video (first 10 seconds): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNc8HJEWMtM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNc8HJEWMtM
- daynthelife 3y ago
  Return of the Obra Dinn is also an amazing game with entirely 1-bit rendering. https://store.steampowered.com/app/653530/Return_of_the_Obra_Dinn/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/653530/Return_of_the_Obra...

tonymet 3y ago

I wish HyperCard would have been the web UI instead of HTML. Simpler, more consistent, more intuitive, fewer distractions.

noduerme 3y ago
It (and Director, and Flash - and early javascript) were too hard to index and rank for search. The searchability paradigm crushed the creative paradigm in web, financially around 1999-2004 and ultimately culturally to the extent that the former model is barely remembered.
- KerrAvon 3y ago
  That’s not why it didn’t happen. The Web took off in 1995; Google was the first really good web search facility, and it arrived in 1998. There were earlier ones (I remember using AltaVista), but generally if you wanted to find things before Google you used either a directory like Yahoo or other web pages to find stuff. We also don’t know what “index and ranking for search” would have looked like in a HyperCard-style web paradigm. Something like Google could work; it would have to be a sophisticated enough to parse stacks instead of HTML, but we’re already deep into an alternate universe, so I’ll stop here. Also, “index and ranking for search” is probably a bad thing. SEO has absolutely destroyed the web.
  - KerrAvon 3y ago
    (I think conflating JavaScript and Flash with HyperCard is a mistake.)
- marginalia_nu 3y ago
  Doesn't really check with how most modern SPAs flourish despite having basically the same problems as Flash of being incompatible with most web crawlers since more often than not you can't trust what they decide to put in the URL bar (if anything) actually links back to the state that is on screen.
  - 3y ago

WoodenChair 3y ago

Shameless plug: If you're looking to make graphics for 1-bit scenarios like this, I make an app for that called Retro Dither for the Mac: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/retro-dither-b-w-is-beautiful/id1586423971?mt=12 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/retro-dither-b-w-is-beautiful/...

ptek 3y ago

Looks great, Seems like the tool to remake Micro$oft Home - Encarta 95 Mind Maze

beagle3 3y ago

Also includes Lil - a programming language quite different from Hyperscript/Applescript, but which is beautiful and interesting in its own right — kind of a “humanized” vector language.

i_don_t_know 3y ago

The creator of Decker talked about the motivation behind Decker, its design and the design of its scripting language lil on the ArrayCast podcast: https://www.arraycast.com/episodes/episode43-john-earnest-decker https://www.arraycast.com/episodes/episode43-john-earnest-de... Very interesting episode!

qwertyshok 3y ago

Will something ESP32-based be able to run Decker?

RodgerTheGreat 3y ago
No.