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Comment by brylie | Hacker News Reader

Is there an open-source hypercard equivalent? It seems that Hypercard made programming very accessible, so it would be good if an open source project/community is continuing the ethos.

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It's not HyperCard, or intended to be, but Twine captures some of the spirit, I think.

http://twinery.org/

https://livecode.com. Source claimed to be at https://livecode.org (can’t find it without registering, but maybe, I didn’t look hard enough). I don’t know how well it tracks the .com offering, either.

The source code seems to be at https://github.com/livecode/livecode

This used to be called MetaCard! I can't believe it's still around; I must have used this thing fifteen years ago.

HTML + javascript. I mean that as a serious answer to your question. I made a handful of stacks back then, and this is the logical replacement. While still not as cool in some ways as Hypercard, at least HTML + javascript is not confined to one company's computers.

Having done quite a lot of hypercard programming back in the day - HTML + javscript is nothing like a replacement. Hypercard's authoring simplicity was what made it so great.

Agreed. It's literally what got me into programming and entrepreneurship. Wrote and sold my first piece of software in Hypercard (and then SuperCard!).

I desperately wish it were still real, for my kids. I think it'd be far be the best way to get them coding.

It might well not have enough contemporary flare and flash for young kids used to modern computers, tablets, phones. But there are "classic Mac" emulators. I imagine they do Hypercard just fine.

I don't disagree - that's what I was thinking of when I said that HTML + javascript is not as cool as Hypercard. But in another way, it's cooler, because when you make something that works in a browser you can share it with the world.

"And if you think that XCode, Python, Processing, or the shit soup of HTML/Javascript/CSS are any kind of substitute for HyperCard, then read this post again. And if you continue to think so, then you might be an autistic typical software “engineer,” and please don’t waste your time commenting here. Sink back into the cube farm hellpit from whence you came.

Otherwise, sit down and contemplate the fact that what has been built once could probably be built again."

http://www.loper-os.org/?p=568

Do we really need to insult the non-neurotypical?

A large part of being autistic is insulting people without knowing it. Which can come across as cold and distant. I think OP was just trying to hint at the open mindset it takes to appreciate something like HyperCard

It's also a quote.

In my view, HC is not just a programming tool, but also a rudimentary database engine. This may have helped make it attractive in its day.

Of course HC was many things to many people. The modern replacement could be identified by what people actually use in daily life for simple programming and databases: Excel.

I wrote an assembler in HC.

I don't know of an open source version, but Supercard is still available for the mac, and will even play a large proportion of Hypercard stacks. http://www.supercard.us/

Pricey, mind!

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