I have several personal information stacks -- one includes all of my "vital statistics" including bank accounts, insurance, credit cards, and the complete contents of my safe deposit box. A second mimics my circuit breaker box, except that it is searchable and includes detailed information about what outlets are on each circuit. My favorite is my Wines database. I've kept track of every wine I've purchased over the last decade including price paid, how many bottles are in the cellar, as well as the usual type, vineyard, and tasting info. My kids all have used Hypercard to create "Inigo" like stacks, some starting with the original "Inigo gets out". My son, now age 13, is creating a Maze, and is learning to put scripted puzzles and other more advanced stuff into his.
Comments to: John Burgess
To me, HyperCard is a software scratchpad--a place for a programmer to doodle. Or perhaps it's more like software plasticine, that you can mould into any shape you like. I've been a software developer on the Mac for over ten years. In that time, Apple has come out with all kinds of interesting technologies (QuickTime, AppleScript and so on). Getting to grips with these technologies can be hard, particularly when the documentation, as good as it is, fails to clarify some important little detail. The only thing you can do then is write some code to try it out. But writing a whole Mac application to try out one system call is just too much work. Which is where HyperCard comes in--it's much simpler to write an XFCN or XCMD than an application. Then it becomes easy to write a few lines of script to try out some function, or even to type a system call directly into the message box! From there, it's a small step to prototyping an entire application in HyperCard. I particularly like this way of programming, because my code is visible to anybody who opens my scripts in the script editor. More than that, they can change my code if they don't like it, and have their change take effect immediately. HyperCard becomes an interactive learning tool for programmers! I have also made several of my toolkits of XFCNs and XCMDs available for other people to use at http://www.geek-central.gen.nz/sw/index.html There you will also find several stacks that make use of these toolkits.
Comments to: Lawrence D'Oliveiro
HyperCard runs my life. Well... ok, perhaps not my entire life. But runs my computer. Really: imagine you have an alarm clock on your computer. Now imagine that instead of just being an "alarm" the clock can do anything your computer can do-- any time you want your computer to do it. Like: - As the webmaster for two web sites, HyperCard automatically updates the home page and a calendar of events page (http://vsa.vassar.edu/~qcvc/calendar.html) for me daily. It's like being a webmaster and not doing any work! - My destop image is changed every day, selecting a random pattern or image. - My computer sends e-mail to everyone I know on their birthday. - My weekly time sheet of freelance work I do is automatically e-mail to my supervisor every Friday night at midnight. - I can set reminders for myself for anything I ever want to remember. I use it to do just about all database management on my computer.
Comments to: Jason F
We put out a correspondence course in meditation. HyperCard is used since the last ten years to run the whole course. Who gets what lesson, who gets billed, what inserts go with which lessons; Inventory of the lessons and which lessons need to be ordered from the printers. We are a small non-profit organization and are not able to hire a programmer. HyperCard is the best solution for us.
Swami Gurupremananda
I have been using Hypercard since in was first released. It is actually the main reason I have continued using Macs instead of switching to PCs. Virtual Basic is getting very good but Hypercard is still much faster to use and build applications with even though it is currently more limited. It seems like apple could expand Hypercard to acheive more than what MS has done with VBasic. Some of the applications I have developed for various organizations with Hypercard: - Complex point of sale, retail accounting systems - Databases for hospitals - Customer/patient tracking systems - Data navigation systems for authors (some for Apple) - Loudspeaker engineering and development tools - Enclosure/cabinetry development systems - Landscape architecture database - Games - Electronic circuit simulators for switchmode power amplifiers and much more... I have made very good money in the past programming Hypercard applications for organizations. They are always pleased and impressed with what can be done quickly and can be used easily by everyone in their organization. I can modify to their needs on the spot most of the time. I can even tell them how to modify it for themselves. I don't think there has ever been an application for the Mac that leveraged the user in the same way that the Mac leverages the user from hardware standpoint. Actually the Mac is software not hardware but HC augments the user in the same way that the Mac does. Jim Croft VP of Audio Engineering American Technology Corporation
Comments to: James J. Croft III
We have authored over 2 gigs of interactive software to assist students in their goal of learning a foreign language at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. Hypercard is ideal for us in many ways. You don't have to be a 'computer programmer' to use it. It's straight forward structure means we can cut and paste functionality into different lessons. It's interpreted nature means we can change external files (like vocab lists,reward graphics etc) without changing the stack itself. We use the quicktime movie format to store our sound and movies files. It just works without hassles or tweaking. We use other authoring tools and for flexible parsing of text entry hypercard is the best. Try doing that with director. :-) Hypercard and Quicktime are the reason we have computer labs with macs in them. For us Hypercard is the killer application which isn't available on the pc.
Comments to: Charles Lever
As well as making my own adventure games in my spare time (in HyperCard of course!), I also enjoy fictional writing. However, I constantly have the problem of coming up with new plot ideas, new characters, and things like that. Recently I was thinking how cool it would be if I could have a program that created random plot and character ideas for me. "No problem," I said. I whipped out my copy of HyperCard 2.4 and cooked up a customizable idea generator in about 2 minutes. Then I entered in the idea "fragments" I wanted. Now I can get random plot and character ideas with one click of the mouse, and it's all thanks to HyperCard. It may not sound like that big of a deal, but it's just another example of how HyperCard has solved my problems!
Matt Reagan
I will never forget my first Mac (the Mac Plus) and the curious little application that came bundled with it...Hypercard. I have always preferred the Mac, and it was not until recent months that I realized that one of the main reasons I held on to the Mac platform was HyperCard. Hypercard was part of the original spirit of the Mac; an easy interface to a powerful system. I have developed my own software in Hypercard: http://members.aol.com/MidiToolz/midi/MidiTools.html This software represents years of work for me; I am not a programmer, but a musician. Hypercard gave me the freedom to create solutions to my own problems. To this day, I own a copy of Metrowerks CodeWarrior that just sits on my shelf collecting dust. A truly non-inspirational piece of work. A 'PC' compiler on my Macintosh...blech! John Rule RCS Programming MidiToolz@AOL.com
John Rule
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Revised: March 16, 1999
URL: http://www.hyperactivesw.com/HCStories/stories.html