The Computer Chronicles: HyperCard
Saturday, August 11th, 2012
Computer Chronicles: HyperCard
An introduction to Apple’s Hypercard. Guests include Apple Fellow and Hypercard creator Bill Atkinson, Hypercard senior engineer Dan Winkler, author of “The Complete Hypercard Handbook” Danny Goodman, and Robert Stein, Publisher of Voyager Company. Demonstrations include Hypercard 1.0, Complete Car Cost Guide, Focal Point, Laserstacks, and National Gallery of Art. Originally broadcast in 1987.
As a long time HyperCard user and lover, this is a wonderful trip down memory lane.
People may forget that the late Gary Kildall wrote CP/M 86 which lost out to MS DOS as the OS of the first IBM PC. His questions are pretty nerdy but then, so was CP/M. Neither of the interviewers really get it the way Atkinson and Winkler are explaining it (simply) and in actuality, few in the computer world really did.
Remember, HyperCard was pre-web, during the old AOL days. I think it would have lasted longer had Apple had better leadership during that time and had a clue of what to do with it but between Apple/Claris and the birth of the web it died out as did Atkinson’s next project: The General Magic “personal intelligent communicator” which was a hybrid smart-phone internet and hypertext device.
Amazing to have been aware and involved in all of this stuff over such an amazing period of technological evolution.
Here are some other HyperCard-related posts at this site:
HyperCard Snow Crystals
The Bee
Confusing Words
Postscript: I was just doing some work on my iPhone and it struck me that aside from the Macintosh Finder in the early days, HyperCard’s iconic (pun intended) home screen was an early prototype of the current iOS home screen.
[via Dale Allyn]
Richard,
I just came to your site to mention HyperCard’s birthday, and you beat me to it! What an amazing program. I can’t think of anything today to match it still. Atkinson was brilliant.
Tim
Tim: I actually didn’t remember the birthday. I did remember a group of us went up to Boston Macworld and saw Atkinson demo it the summer it was released and if memory serves, we went back to Forman with a beta copy or a real copy we bought at the show.
I agree, it remains one of the most amazing pieces of software I’ve ever used, maybe ever will use. It was the right software at the right time for many of us and I’ll always have fond memories of both the early excitement and continued excitement for ten years. Wow. Thanks for thinking of this site Tim.
Nice trip down memory lane! I still have my Goodman book (and all my other HyperCard manuals) — can’t bear to throw them out. Magic application, magical times.
Alex: I have my original HyperCard disks, all the advertising material from Boston Macworld 1986 (or 87?) when it was released and more. I wish I’d kept an old SE/30 to run stacks on though, no way to run all the cool stuff we made and collected anymore.