taylorj@yvax.byu.edu (09/30/89)
I recently made a comparison of features of the two HyperCard clones (for a demonstration at the university users group). It's in Microsoft Word 4.0 format, and I can't create a plain text version because the text is too small and I used the (wonderful!) table feature. But if enough people are interested I will be happy to post it. In any case, for those considering either SuperCard or PLUS, here are my opinions and recommendations: PLUS is simply HyperCard with bells and whistles (and bugs) and some sorely needed features such as larger windows, "library stacks" to hold shared resources, multiple text fonts/styles/sizes in fields, color, etc. It's generally quite compatible with HyperCard stacks. It seems to be basically unusable (i.e. crashes frequently) on a Mac with less than 2 Meg of RAM. The manual is abysmal. The english is actually so bad it's funny! It's full of useless trivia and devoid of useful details. SuperCard is a magnitude or two above both HyperCard and PLUS. It's incredibly powerful but the power comes at a price: it's very difficult to use and it's very SLOW! But if you want multiple windows, high-powered graphics, customizeable menus, fast animation, or anything else you keep wishing HyperCard had, then SuperCard is the only way to go. Once you get used to the separate editor it's quite nice (copy and paste multiple cards, create and edit icons, cursors, and color palettes, compare two scripts side by side). Can only run small stacks (projects) on Macs with less than 2 Meg of RAM, but since the reason you need SuperCard is to make big complicated stacks you might as well forget using them on 1 Meg machines. Jim Taylor Microcomputer Support for Curriculum Brigham Young University taylorj@byuvax.bitnet
athos@apple.com (Rick Eames) (10/02/89)
In article <832taylorj@yvax.byu.edu> taylorj@yvax.byu.edu writes: > PLUS is simply HyperCard with bells and whistles (and bugs) and some sorely > needed features such as larger windows, "library stacks" to hold shared > resources, multiple text fonts/styles/sizes in fields, color, etc. It's > generally quite compatible with HyperCard stacks. It seems to be basically > unusable (i.e. crashes frequently) on a Mac with less than 2 Meg of RAM. The > manual is abysmal. The english is actually so bad it's funny! It's full of > useless trivia and devoid of useful details. I'm afraid you're a little off on this one. Try using PLUS 1.11 which fixes most of the bugs you speak of. SuperCard doesn't do much better with 1 meg. I tried. It was far too slow. Rick
taylorj@yvax.byu.edu (10/04/89)
Ok, due to wild clamorings and popular support, I am posting my summary of features and differences between HyperCard and the two clones. It's in both Word 4.0 and MacWrite format. Coming soon to a comp.binaries.mac near you! Jim Taylor Microcomputer Support for Curriculum Brigham Young University taylorj@byuvax taylorj@yvax.byu.edu