HyperCard
Apple's stack-based hypermedia authoring system, created by Bill Atkinson (original Macintosh team member). Released August 11, 1987 at the Boston MacWorld Expo. Bundled free with every Macintosh through the late 1980s.
What it was
HyperCard let users build stacks of cards (think index cards with graphics, fields, buttons), navigate between them with buttons triggering scripts in the HyperTalk scripting language. The result was a near-mainstream consumer hypermedia tool predating the web by 5 years.
Atkinson called it "an Erector Set for software" — the lowering of the barrier between "user" and "developer" was the point.
Pi coverage
- 1987-10 — V09 N10 — ★★★ HyperCard SIG launches (Robert C. Platt)
- 1987-11 — V09 N11 — HyperCard News column launches (Platt)
- 1987-12 — V09 N12 — ★★★★ Bill Atkinson visits Pi; Rick Chapman "A Simple Script for HyperCard"
- 1988-01 — V10 N01 — HyperCard SIG + Anomalies (Chapman)
- 1991-01 — V13 N01 — HyperCard 2.0 coverage
- 1999-09 — V21 N05 — "HyperCard: What is it?" (sunset begins)
- 2001-07 — V23 N04 — "Save HyperCard!" (Collins)
Versions and decline
- HyperCard 1.0 (Aug 1987)
- HyperCard 1.2 (1988) — covered at Pi 1988-08 — V10 N08
- HyperCard 2.0 (1990, debut at Pi 1991-01 — V13 N01)
- HyperCard 2.4 (1998) — last major update
- Discontinued by Apple in 2004
Significance
HyperCard's importance at Pi cannot be overstated. The HyperCard SIG was one of Pi's most influential SIGs through 1988-1992. Pi members built educational stacks, organizational stacks, kit-of-parts stacks. The decline of HyperCard at Pi tracks the late-1990s rise of the web as a competing low-friction publishing/authoring environment.
Connections
- Bill Atkinson — creator
- HyperCard Launch — topic page
- HyperCard SIG
- QuickDraw — Atkinson's other major Mac contribution
- MacPaint — Atkinson's launch-Mac contribution