Clark Quinn (cnquinn@knowledgeu.com)
Mon, 13 Sep 1999 11:49:36 -0700
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 1999 11:49:36 -0700 From: "Clark Quinn" <cnquinn@knowledgeu.com> Subject: Re: hyperstudio??
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I want to thank Jerry for raising an important issue. I don't know
of a language that really has no threshold (despite Logo claims), but
the elegant implementation of the notion of "incremental advantage"
(Andy diSessa) still seems to be a missing target. I've written
before that HyperCard has a nice approximation; that it very much had
some a 'invest a little bit more time and effort, gain a little bit
more power'. It had a bit of a hiccup at the learning HyperTalk
level, but still allowed a fair return on investment.
I would think SuperCard is a better kid thing than HyperStudio, more
fully OO than HyperCard, still all the primitives, and color. Of
course, it's only Mac.
And yes, the ceiling did end up a little too low. I still think it
would be a good idea to use something like SmallTalk to implement a
HyperCard interface. That is, an onion-layered object-oriented system
where you could easily pull things together out of default objects,
but they would be explorable: you could start changing properties,
then start scripting, and eventually program, right up to full OO
language capabilities. Whether it would be a procedural or
functional language is an open question. Then, you'd build all your
apps in it, and have full power over your computing environment.
Okay, so I'm rambling a bit :-).
Of course, diSessa would argue that Boxer has this capability. But
he's never got the support to develop it to commercial polish.
Of course, this begs the question of whether learning to program
really makes sense for all. I've been bipolar on the issue: I
believe programming is the ultimate flexible tool, but also that
people have to know what computers can do, not how to program them.
Is it better to give most people tools that allow them to create what
they're trying to do? For instance, I haven't used a general purpose
programming language in years; I did prototyping in HyperCard, and
now mostly do it with paper and Powerpoint, leaving the rest to
designers and programmers. -- Clark
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