Whoah... awesome history. I tend to agree with you too.
Ultimately, we're constrained by the tools we use, "the tools that people 'think' are best for us." Opensource is not _as_ constrained by the organisational strutures that tend to result from the use of these tools. Hence creativity and exploration thrive.
It's like everything, you can't repress the underground music cultures because 'Punk' will become popular.
You can't start 'a war based on lies' beacuse 'the people' will revolt (unless you keep them ignorant, ba-doom-ching!;)
You can't restrict software development to a single development environment because creativity and innovation are stifled
You can't fertilise your crops because the soil becomes less fertile, more quickly.
What we (usually unknowingly) aim for is some sort of balance.
Anyway, to add to what I meant about Apple not killing HC:
While the design of Mac OS X has similarities to the hypercard design, many well designed systems will often have similarities between their architectures. So saying that the Mac OS X frameworks is _based_ on the Hypercard framework is like saying there's similarities between the molecular designs of a tree and a flower. The fundamental patterns (atoms) exist in both, but they get implemented (into molecules) in very different ways.
To see patterns in different things, we just have to get the granularities of our observations close to matching each other. A hard thing to do when the contexts (or artefacts) are very different.
And I definately, now that you mention it, see the NextStep roots.:)
I think you're on the right track here with this thought, see my reply post to the thread "Apple killed HyperCard" about the principles of Hypercard existing in the MacOSX frameworks. I think Apple have kept the Hypercard principles alive, but let the Hypercard product die.:)
I don't think Apple has killed Hypercard at all. I think the fundamental principles behind Hypercard have been translated into Objective-C, Cocoa and many of the MacOSX technologies relating to these - Applescript, Delagates, outlets, forward chains, the runtime message lookup, object introspection, cocoa bindings, and most of the current Mac OS X frameworks are based on or around the principles and OO patterns of Hypercard. These architectural principles have been available in other languages for a while, but Apple has paid careful attention to the designs of MacOSX, and I think they've learnt from the Hypercard experience of yesteryear, and brought that experience into the new age of software development for the Macintosh. The difference between the development environment that Apple provides today (xCode), and what it used to provide (HyperCard) is that today's tools give all the seasoned C/C++/Java programmers the ability to develop however they want to AND in addition, Apple provides the opportunity to use the frameworks MacOSX provides (which, to labor the point, I think are Hypercard-like in principles, hence the elegance of Cocoa app designs) So we get our cake, and get to eat it too!:)
While everyone debates about the fact that Apple has given Hypercard the flick, I disagree. It's fundamentally there in MacOSX if you look beneath the surface. Software development is about learning from your experience and using that to your advantage, and this 'experience' is what software engineering using systems of patterns is all about. The developer documentation is pretty heavy on the patterns, architectures and designs inherent in MacOSX because they want people to use them and benefit from them, beacuse, in turn, Apple benefits. I think Apple has combined both the business and programming experiences they got from the 'Hypercard days', with the culture and benefits of the opensource community and that's why they are steadily gaining a strong foothold in the marketplace with MacOSX and their products.
Hypercard still kinda-sorta lives on. At least, that's what I rekon.:)
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Whoah... awesome history. I tend to agree with you too. Ultimately, we're constrained by the tools we use, "the tools that people 'think' are best for us." Opensource is not _as_ constrained by the organisational strutures that tend to result from the use of these tools. Hence creativity and exploration thrive. It's like everything, you can't repress the underground music cultures because 'Punk' will become popular. You can't start 'a war based on lies' beacuse 'the people' will revolt (unless you keep them ignorant, ba-doom-ching! ;)
You can't restrict software development to a single development environment because creativity and innovation are stifled
You can't fertilise your crops because the soil becomes less fertile, more quickly.
What we (usually unknowingly) aim for is some sort of balance.
Anyway, to add to what I meant about Apple not killing HC:
While the design of Mac OS X has similarities to the hypercard design, many well designed systems will often have similarities between their architectures. So saying that the Mac OS X frameworks is _based_ on the Hypercard framework is like saying there's similarities between the molecular designs of a tree and a flower. The fundamental patterns (atoms) exist in both, but they get implemented (into molecules) in very different ways.
To see patterns in different things, we just have to get the granularities of our observations close to matching each other. A hard thing to do when the contexts (or artefacts) are very different.
And I definately, now that you mention it, see the NextStep roots. :)
I think you're on the right track here with this thought, see my reply post to the thread "Apple killed HyperCard" about the principles of Hypercard existing in the MacOSX frameworks. I think Apple have kept the Hypercard principles alive, but let the Hypercard product die. :)
I don't think Apple has killed Hypercard at all. :)
:)
I think the fundamental principles behind Hypercard have been translated into Objective-C, Cocoa and many of the MacOSX technologies relating to these - Applescript, Delagates, outlets, forward chains, the runtime message lookup, object introspection, cocoa bindings, and most of the current Mac OS X frameworks are based on or around the principles and OO patterns of Hypercard.
These architectural principles have been available in other languages for a while, but Apple has paid careful attention to the designs of MacOSX, and I think they've learnt from the Hypercard experience of yesteryear, and brought that experience into the new age of software development for the Macintosh.
The difference between the development environment that Apple provides today (xCode), and what it used to provide (HyperCard) is that today's tools give all the seasoned C/C++/Java programmers the ability to develop however they want to AND in addition, Apple provides the opportunity to use the frameworks MacOSX provides (which, to labor the point, I think are Hypercard-like in principles, hence the elegance of Cocoa app designs) So we get our cake, and get to eat it too!
While everyone debates about the fact that Apple has given Hypercard the flick, I disagree. It's fundamentally there in MacOSX if you look beneath the surface.
Software development is about learning from your experience and using that to your advantage, and this 'experience' is what software engineering using systems of patterns is all about. The developer documentation is pretty heavy on the patterns, architectures and designs inherent in MacOSX because they want people to use them and benefit from them, beacuse, in turn, Apple benefits.
I think Apple has combined both the business and programming experiences they got from the 'Hypercard days', with the culture and benefits of the opensource community and that's why they are steadily gaining a strong foothold in the marketplace with MacOSX and their products.
Hypercard still kinda-sorta lives on. At least, that's what I rekon.
Cheers!