LiveCode, the New HyperCard, now 25 years old and still largely unnoticed.

https://www.livecode.com/
A high level, multiplatform, XTalk development environment.
And now, with CBD added! Oh, sorry, I meant A.I. assistants (yeah, yeah…)

NOT an ad – I’m just a user of the product.
Let me sing you the song of my people…

First there was HyperCard, thanks Bill Atkinson (R.I.P)
Introduced in 1987, it was last updated in 1998, and last sold in 2004.
While it was deliberately limited, (thanks Steve Jobs) it was amazingly useful. Not a true development environment, nevertheless professionals used it, and the groundbreaking adventure game “Myst” – produced by Rand and Robyn Miller of Cyan, was created with it and used “extensions” to allow it to be colorized.

As a personal aside, for me, it was the software parallel of the Macintosh – it allowed me to do things I never could have done without it, and provided experiences that allowed me to go beyond my limitations and do more than I ever thought I could.

Then, in 1989, there was SuperCard thanks Bill Appleton – a different Bill, although they could have shared the same monogrammed towels.

SuperCard was a “high level development environment” which did create real Mac applications. It had compatibility with Hypercard stacks, x-commands, and HyperTalk, was fully color and allowed you to make any kind of human interface element from buttons to floating palettes that he Mac supported.

As another personal note, I made a living in the ’90s as a programmer, mostly using SuperCard, to create educational and corporate programs as well as art installations.

SuperCard was beloved by many, but with a financially tumultuous history, multiple acquisitions, the advent of OS 10, and the death of Scott Simon who was the owner/developer at the time, SuperCard became another 32-bit application doomed to extinction. Along with everything I wrote with it.

No matter for me, as the ’90s ended, my job description changed from software guy to systems guy. But my fascination for the “style and approach” of HyperCard/SuperCard never diminished.

HyperCard begat MetaCard (a clone) which begat Revolution, which became LiveCode, first appearing in 2001. LiveCode could open HyperCard Stacks (I think it still can…) and uses it’s own XTalk variant. It’s fully internet aware, multi platform (Mac, Windows, Linux and sadly, an unmaintained Raspberry Pi ARM version). It is wildly capable – beyond the space available to describe here. I suggest you look them up – the best software company in Glasgow.

I’ve taught Intro to Programming to High School kids with it. Hired developers (hey, I’m too busy) to write corporate applications with it. Used it just as I did with HyperCard – to create one-off utilities that get something done with it. Still the same metaphor as HyperCard. Yep, lately the addition of A.I. to the product has been a new aspect. No opinion there yet.

Loved by many, ignored or unknown to many more.

Cheers….