Writing Mac and iOS Apps Shouldn't Be So Difficult

100% agree on this!

And I’d like to add it also should not be so difficult architecture-wise. As an experienced (10+ yrs) iOS/macOS developer, when I start a new project, I have to do a ton of architecture to have a correct project base, and I find it weird. It should be builtin. At least we should have something, which I could change if I would disagree with the chosen architecture, but currently we have just pretty much nothing.

Either way, expect no HyperCard (or work-alikes) from Apple. But how about other vendors? What about open-source projects? Nothing there, either. Oh, there is no shortage of attempts. And all of them are failures for the same reason: they insist on being more capable, more complexity-laden than HyperCard. And thus, none of them can readily substitute for it.

https://www.loper-os.org/?p=568#selection-660.0-660.5

As someone who did a ton of VB5-6 dev work back in the day, the same applies to all platforms.

I think everything Brent says applies far beyond Mac and iOS apps. The engine + interpreted DSL architecture just makes so much sense.

Are there other examples of software built this way?

Just compile .NET WPF in Avalonia and be done with it.