[comp.sys.mac.hypercard] HyperCard 1.1 in Review

bayes@hpfcdc.HP.COM (Scott Bayes) (03/19/88)

I just got HC 1.1 last night, and played with it a bit.  I suspect some
of you out there haven't had a chance to get hold of it yet.  So, I'll
post a short review.

WARNING: personal opinions follow!

MANAGEMENT SUMMARY

Don't crawl a mile on your knees through broken glass and glowing
cinders to get this one.  Joe-Bob says "No sale".

MORE DETAIL

HC 1.1 does a few more things than the first commercial rev (1.01 ?),
but not a whole helluva lot more.  3 stacks:  Area Codes, Datebook and
Phone, have been trivially updated to "internationalize" them.  Probably
a couple hours work.

3 buttons have been added to import text/data, export text, export data,
where data means something like "spreadsheet fields".  They seem not
well implemented; they don't even use Standard File dialogues to get to
the file.  You have to write down or memorize the file and path before
starting HC, then type the whole mess in.  Blechh!  HyperCard carries on
the tradition of butchering The Interface...

They have added "text arrows".  With textArrows on, left, right, up, and
down arrows move you around in a text field as you'd expect in a screen
editor.  They also work in the Message Box.  OPTION-arrow works as did
arrows in the old HC.  Turning textArrows off leaves things as they were
in previous HC rev.

They specify a minimum memory (via MF Get Info) size of 750K.  And they
correct some trivial errors in the HC Users' Guide.

Finally there's an Update Home Stack button, which seems only to add the
textArrows checkbox to Preferences (I haven't looked at the script yet).

That's it folks. HC 1.1, in all its glory.

Where are the "text buttons"?  Why did the import/export buttons not use
SF dialogues?  Why didn't it shrink in size, get faster, or do something
worth publishing a new rev for?  Why did Apple bother sending out a whole
disk for this? Will Bill marry Adele (joke ?!?)?

Scott "ink wiring mined swan tune owe" Bayes
bayes@hpfclw

chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (03/21/88)

>That's it folks. HC 1.1, in all its glory.

You completely forget the bug fixes. HC 1.1 is, first and foremost, a
bug-fix release. They weren't going for new features, they were just
cleaning up the glitches.

>Where are the "text buttons"?

Try HyperCard 2.0. 

>Why did the import/export buttons not use
>SF dialogues?  Why didn't it shrink in size, get faster, or do something
>worth publishing a new rev for?  Why did Apple bother sending out a whole
>disk for this?

Think bug fixes.... Releases don't always imply revolutionary changes,
sometimes they're evolutionary. 




Chuq Von Rospach			chuq@sun.COM		Delphi: CHUQ

                               Speed it up. Keep it Simple. Ship it on time.
                                                            -- Bill Atkinson

edmoy@violet.berkeley.edu (03/21/88)

In article <10520005@hpfcdc.HP.COM> bayes@hpfcdc.HP.COM (Scott Bayes) writes:
>  Why didn't it shrink in size, get faster, or do something
>worth publishing a new rev for?  Why did Apple bother sending out a whole
>disk for this? Will Bill marry Adele (joke ?!?)?

My guess why 1.1 was released is because it does support locked volumes,
and Apple is pushing CD-ROM technology, so BINGO.

Edward Moy
Workstation Software Support Group
University of California
Berkeley, CA  94720

edmoy@violet.Berkeley.EDU
ucbvax!violet!edmoy

leonardr@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu (03/21/88)

	And let's not forget that you can now get internationalized versions of
Hypercard in which you can edit your scripts (as well as do fields, etc.) in
foreign languages.  Although we know how egocentric Americans tend to be, this
really is an IMPORTANT item, and should not be overlooked!!


+---------------------------------+-----------------------------------+
+                                 +  Any thing I say may be taken as  +
+   Leonard Rosenthol             +  fact, then again you might decide+
+   President, LazerWare, inc.    +  that it really isn't, so you     +
+                                 +  never know, do you??             +
+   leonardr@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu     +                                   +
+   GEnie:  MACgician             +                                   +
+   Delphi: MACgician             +                                   +
+                                 +                                   +
+---------------------------------+-----------------------------------+

bayes@hpfcdc.HP.COM (Scott Bayes) (03/22/88)

Ahhhh! The bug fixes!!

But they were never mentioned in the ReadMe.

Oh well...

BTW, there may be a new bug in 1.1. I'll have to pull out the old rev and
try it.

It's an 8-card, 1 bkgd "Birthday party invitation" stack. Has 1 background
field. I tried to do print stack... with 2-up, fullsize on a page, and
folding pages (not 3-hole punch format, whatever it's called), print darker.
It only printed cards 1,3,5,7, leaving blank bottoms of pages for cards
2,4,6,8.

The stack was created in the old HyperCard (??? How do I check this?) but
never printed there, as I was awaiting final scheduling info.

So when is 2.0 coming out???

I want text buttons.

Scott Bayes

p.s. Thanks for the corrections. Keeps me honest.
S

bayes@hpfcdc.HP.COM (Scott Bayes) (03/22/88)

Sorry, forgot to mention. ImageWriter II, Best printing mode.

Scott

davide@cs.qmc.ac.uk (David Edmondson) (03/22/88)

Does the internationalisation of the diary stack etc. involve a
fix of the date conversion bug experienced with UK systems or
is it a work-around?

The bug is that converting to a short date works fine but
converting back to a long date or any other form works as if
the short date was a short US date.  Try the following on a UK
system:

on mouseUp
  put the long date into temp
  put temp && return into card field 1
  convert temp to date
  put temp && return after card field 1
  convert temp to long date
  put temp after card field 1
end mouseUp


Cheers, Dave

Dave Edmondson, QMC, London.      davide@uk.ac.qmc.cs

ns@CAT.CMU.EDU (Nicholas Spies) (03/23/88)

In article <220100009@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> leonardr@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu writes:
>
>
>	And let's not forget that you can now get internationalized versions of
>Hypercard in which you can edit your scripts (as well as do fields, etc.) in
>foreign languages...

Does V1.1 cure the bug that prevents selection of a word with a double click
when it includes the German double-s character (looks like a "B", control-s)?
Double-clicking on "groBen" ("grossen") results in "gro" or "en" being
selected in V1.0.1.


-- 
Nicholas Spies			ns@cat.cmu.edu.arpa
Center for Design of Educational Computing
Carnegie Mellon University

bayes@hpfcdc.HP.COM (Scott Bayes) (03/24/88)

Re HC 1.1 bugfixes and (hidden) features, eg international (important to me,
my wife's Japanese) languages, etc:

So where'd you people find all this out already? It wasn't in the ReadMe,
I didn't see it in MacUser, MacTutor hardly recognizes the existence of
HC.

Does somebody have Winkler's home phone number? Is there a conspiracy to
keep me in the dark? :-)

Seriously, what is the best source of info on HC; current info, not textbook
stuff like the Goodman?

Scott Bayes
bayes@hpfclw

jgreely@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (J Greely) (03/26/88)

In article <1202@PT.CS.CMU.EDU> ns@CAT.CMU.EDU (Nicholas Spies) writes:
>Does V1.1 cure the bug that prevents selection of a word with a double click
>when it includes the German double-s character (looks like a "B", control-s)?
>Double-clicking on "groBen" ("grossen") results in "gro" or "en" being
>selected in V1.0.1.

Speaking of text handling, when is HC going to realize that quotation marks
should be treated as part of a word?  I love typing into a field, and watching
quotation marks wrap seperately at the end of lines.  For a simple example, "
this" is what you get when a quoted word appears at the end of a line.

  *Sigh*.  Version 2.0, anyone?
-- 
J Greely		      | The Ohio State University,
(jgreely@cis.ohio-state.edu)  | Department of Computer and Information Sciences
"Name of the target, Batman!  | "Those who do not read rec.humor,
 It's Crufty Software!"	      |  are condemned to repeat it."

davide@cs.qmc.ac.uk (David Edmondson) (03/28/88)

Expires:

Sender:

Followup-To:

Keywords:


This is a repost of a message which I think only went to the UK
last time.

Does the internationalisation of the diary stack etc. involve a
fix of the date conversion bug experienced with UK systems or
is it a work-around?

The bug is that converting to a short UK  date works fine but
converting back to a long date or any other form works as if
the short date was a short US date, This means that any stack
which uses dates in a non-trivial way only works one day a
month.

Try the following on a UK system:

on mouseUp
  put the long date into temp
  put temp && return into card field 1
  convert temp to date
  put temp && return after card field 1
  convert temp to long date
  put temp after card field 1
end mouseUp


Cheers, Dave

Dave Edmondson, QMC, London.      davide@uk.ac.qmc.cs