Re:Think Retro: How HyperCard inspired a generation of futur...
by joezydeco on Friday January 16, 2015 @10:03AM
(#8899262)
The "card" metaphor added an artificial constraint to programming that helped a lot of people figure out what they wanted to do and get it done quickly.
You weren't handed a command line and told "okay, now make a program out of this and, oh yeah, you'll need a UI". The UI stuff was pretty much baked into the system. Cards were your screens, and elements could be quickly dropped into place.
Things done to cards stayed put when you traveled back and forth through the stack. That's an important nuance. Also, most of the UI elements were already set up to do some simple things and make the stack work, but later they could be scripted into doing more advanced stuff.
WIMP UIs were still a really really new thing in 1986, but HyperCard was the first construction kit that let you play with that system without learning all the underlying toolkit code.
You weren't handed a command line and told "okay, now make a program out of this and, oh yeah, you'll need a UI". The UI stuff was pretty much baked into the system. Cards were your screens, and elements could be quickly dropped into place.
Things done to cards stayed put when you traveled back and forth through the stack. That's an important nuance. Also, most of the UI elements were already set up to do some simple things and make the stack work, but later they could be scripted into doing more advanced stuff.
WIMP UIs were still a really really new thing in 1986, but HyperCard was the first construction kit that let you play with that system without learning all the underlying toolkit code.