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If HyperCard had had a good network API, things would have been a lot different. The thing that steamrollered HyperCard was Visual BASIC, which could talk to al

by kabdib 13y ago

If HyperCard had had a good network API, things would have been a lot different. The thing that steamrollered HyperCard was Visual BASIC, which could talk to all kinds of system services, and once it had COM support, could talk to just about anything on the planet. Also, everyone understood BASIC, and HyperTalk, though interesting and easy to use, was very closed and pretty much a toy. Apple's networking APIs weren't very well designed. In fact, you couldn't even get to AppleShare volumes; there wasn't an official API to mount 'em. So I wrote one, and I was still getting occasional email about the Mount XCMD a decade later. Apple just didn't have much vision or follow-through back in the late 80s and early 90s.

gilgoomesh 13y ago
I think it's difficult to point at any one, two or three things about Hypercard that caused it to slowly die. It very much died a death of a thousand cuts. a) It was written quickly by one programmer (Bill Atkinson) who left Apple shortly after and (if rumors are believed) no one else really understood his code. b) It never really adapted to colour displays c) It never adapted to variable size displays d) It had no networking so it couldn't compete with the web e) It didn't run on Windows or Unix so it couldn't compete with the web f) It was closed source and proprietary so it couldn't compete with the web g) The free version of Hypercard was made read-only and lost the ability to write and edit stacks (taking away the entire point of Hypercard) h) XCMDs were a pain to write but required for almost anything (Hypercard's API were never really extended to include new features as the Mac added them) i) Apple themselves stopped using it for all help and tutorials on the Mac so people stopped experiencing its metaphors when they first used their Macs j) Apple moved it to Claris (who killed everything they touched)
flomo 13y ago
> The thing that steamrollered HyperCard was Visual BASIC True from a market standpoint, I recall one of the Mac magazines had an article about jerry-rigging a database front-end in HyperCard, and it was clear it was no VB. However, more similar in spirit to HyperCard was Lotus Notes, with its networked hypertext document databases where data storage was largely abstracted away. That was a proprietary web before there was the web. (However with an awful UI and ugly templates.)
- doctorwho 13y ago
  Lotus Notes was an awful way to do anything. It allowed people with little to no programming skill to destroy the IT capabilities of small business and non-profits. If that had been backed by anyone except Lotus it would have died on the drawing board (as it should have).
  - flomo 13y ago
    That was the entire appeal of Notes/Hypercard, people could throw together a small database application and it wasn't any more difficult than creating a spreadsheet. (The big difference was that Notes apps were automatically network client-server.) I think it's rather cynical and elitist to say that something which empowered users "destroyed IT capabilities", and it's not like many of those small orgs really had IT capabilities. But like HC, the Notes designer software was turned into an added-cost product, and after that both Notes and HC became the domain of 'IT experts' that knew how to work around the limitations of a rinky-dink platform. This was all long ago, for most people now Notes is just a terrible email application.
    - doctorwho 13y ago
      Notes was always a terrible email application :) You are right about the level of IT capability of most small shops, maybe I "crippled" would have been better than "destroyed". But elitist? Have you ever considered working on your home furnace? There are people who can do these things. The ones who THINK they can do it are Darwin Award winners. The downside of an amateur rolling their own solution in Notes was not life threatening but it certainly wasn't smart. Notes gave people who had no idea what they were doing the confidence to build solutions that were fine for personal use but completely unsustainable at even small office scale. The "experts" who adopted HC and Notes were the ones who did the real damage though. These folks (and I knew a few) were just a step above the guy in the office who refilled the toner in the photocopier. They created half-working systems and then moved on. They didn't have to live with the technical debt they left in their wake. They set unrealistic expectations for what good IT solutions should cost and left guys like me trying to clean up their mess for years.

by kabdib 13y ago

gilgoomesh 13y ago

I think it's difficult to point at any one, two or three things about Hypercard that caused it to slowly die. It very much died a death of a thousand cuts. a) It was written quickly by one programmer (Bill Atkinson) who left Apple shortly after and (if rumors are believed) no one else really understood his code. b) It never really adapted to colour displays c) It never adapted to variable size displays d) It had no networking so it couldn't compete with the web e) It didn't run on Windows or Unix so it couldn't compete with the web f) It was closed source and proprietary so it couldn't compete with the web g) The free version of Hypercard was made read-only and lost the ability to write and edit stacks (taking away the entire point of Hypercard) h) XCMDs were a pain to write but required for almost anything (Hypercard's API were never really extended to include new features as the Mac added them) i) Apple themselves stopped using it for all help and tutorials on the Mac so people stopped experiencing its metaphors when they first used their Macs j) Apple moved it to Claris (who killed everything they touched)

flomo 13y ago

> The thing that steamrollered HyperCard was Visual BASIC True from a market standpoint, I recall one of the Mac magazines had an article about jerry-rigging a database front-end in HyperCard, and it was clear it was no VB. However, more similar in spirit to HyperCard was Lotus Notes, with its networked hypertext document databases where data storage was largely abstracted away. That was a proprietary web before there was the web. (However with an awful UI and ugly templates.)

doctorwho 13y ago
Lotus Notes was an awful way to do anything. It allowed people with little to no programming skill to destroy the IT capabilities of small business and non-profits. If that had been backed by anyone except Lotus it would have died on the drawing board (as it should have).
- flomo 13y ago
  That was the entire appeal of Notes/Hypercard, people could throw together a small database application and it wasn't any more difficult than creating a spreadsheet. (The big difference was that Notes apps were automatically network client-server.) I think it's rather cynical and elitist to say that something which empowered users "destroyed IT capabilities", and it's not like many of those small orgs really had IT capabilities. But like HC, the Notes designer software was turned into an added-cost product, and after that both Notes and HC became the domain of 'IT experts' that knew how to work around the limitations of a rinky-dink platform. This was all long ago, for most people now Notes is just a terrible email application.
  - doctorwho 13y ago
    Notes was always a terrible email application :) You are right about the level of IT capability of most small shops, maybe I "crippled" would have been better than "destroyed". But elitist? Have you ever considered working on your home furnace? There are people who can do these things. The ones who THINK they can do it are Darwin Award winners. The downside of an amateur rolling their own solution in Notes was not life threatening but it certainly wasn't smart. Notes gave people who had no idea what they were doing the confidence to build solutions that were fine for personal use but completely unsustainable at even small office scale. The "experts" who adopted HC and Notes were the ones who did the real damage though. These folks (and I knew a few) were just a step above the guy in the office who refilled the toner in the photocopier. They created half-working systems and then moved on. They didn't have to live with the technical debt they left in their wake. They set unrealistic expectations for what good IT solutions should cost and left guys like me trying to clean up their mess for years.