Wouldn't it be nice to have an ink enabled Windo

[Bishop]

Wouldn't it be nice to have an ink enabled Windows version of HyperCard (or some reasonable facsimile thereof)?

[Big Lar]

Bishop,

Everyone likes a good HyperCard stack. :) But, could you expound a bit on why you might use this? What would ink-enabling the stack do for you?

I'm pretty sure I know where you are going with this, but I want to hear you say it. Thanks,

--Lar

[Big Lar]

Bishop,

Everyone likes a good HyperCard stack. :) But, could you expound a bit on why you might use this? What would ink-enabling the stack do for you?

I'm pretty sure I know where you are going with this, but I want to hear you say it. Thanks,

--Lar

[Bishop]

Lar:

Just thinking back to all those stacks of index cards I handwrote in college for reference notes, flash cards, study guides, etc. That card stack metaphor was very useful in so many settings.

Spring forward to Hypercard. Asymetrix Toolbook was ok for Windows in its early days (I used it to write a flash card system for my wife to study for the CPA exam - which she passed). The marriage of the card stack with simple database technology was powerful. How many PIM's have come and gone (and how many are struggling) for being difficult to use and imposing UI limitations that get in the way of the power of that stack of index cards?

Spring forward to the tablet. Handwriting (which for tactile learning types is an important tool and has a much wider perceptive bandwidth) can be brought back into play. We could create quick, freeform, even random stacks in our own handwriting captured in the tablet.

Rambling, I know; but I think you get my drift.

[Bishop]

Lar:

Just thinking back to all those stacks of index cards I handwrote in college for reference notes, flash cards, study guides, etc. That card stack metaphor was very useful in so many settings.

Spring forward to Hypercard. Asymetrix Toolbook was ok for Windows in its early days (I used it to write a flash card system for my wife to study for the CPA exam - which she passed). The marriage of the card stack with simple database technology was powerful. How many PIM's have come and gone (and how many are struggling) for being difficult to use and imposing UI limitations that get in the way of the power of that stack of index cards?

Spring forward to the tablet. Handwriting (which for tactile learning types is an important tool and has a much wider perceptive bandwidth) can be brought back into play. We could create quick, freeform, even random stacks in our own handwriting captured in the tablet.

Rambling, I know; but I think you get my drift.

[richardl]

I think HTML and all the complimentary technologies have pretty much killed off anything that was left of Hypercard and Toolbook.

What could you do with Hypercard that you can't do with the web?

[richardl]

I think HTML and all the complimentary technologies have pretty much killed off anything that was left of Hypercard and Toolbook.

What could you do with Hypercard that you can't do with the web?

[Bishop]

I think HTML's ability to deliver functionality with little to no local code (past browser compatibility) killed the appeal of Hypercard and Toolbook for application development that focused on mass retail distribution or internal corporate IT projects.

What appealed to me most about Toolbook was the ability to quickly, with little coding, whip up a one-off solution for some oddball collection or specific need that I could use on my machine. The hobbyist appeal. If there's a tool like that for HTML, I'd certainly look at it.

Did you ever keep those physical stacks of "While you were out" slips as a quasi-rolodex and contacts log? I had a Toolbook app that let me type in the data into a comparable form. I could search and flip through the stack just like I did the paper stack. Imagine that kind of app with ink support. Imagine what we could do if we had an XP Toolbook for our individual use.

To get a comparable solution now, I'd need to brush up on my Visual Basic (for .Net), JET engine/DAO interfaces, and spend a few days coding my one-off solution. Not sure I have the time or patience to pull that off.

I could get 60% of what I wanted if the Journal application window acted as a container for multiple notes in the container at the same time. I could get 70% of what I wanted if cardfile.exe from Windows 3.x ran on XP and supported ink. 80% if the old Tornado for Windows was still around, ran on XP and supported ink.

[Bishop]

I think HTML's ability to deliver functionality with little to no local code (past browser compatibility) killed the appeal of Hypercard and Toolbook for application development that focused on mass retail distribution or internal corporate IT projects.

What appealed to me most about Toolbook was the ability to quickly, with little coding, whip up a one-off solution for some oddball collection or specific need that I could use on my machine. The hobbyist appeal. If there's a tool like that for HTML, I'd certainly look at it.

Did you ever keep those physical stacks of "While you were out" slips as a quasi-rolodex and contacts log? I had a Toolbook app that let me type in the data into a comparable form. I could search and flip through the stack just like I did the paper stack. Imagine that kind of app with ink support. Imagine what we could do if we had an XP Toolbook for our individual use.

To get a comparable solution now, I'd need to brush up on my Visual Basic (for .Net), JET engine/DAO interfaces, and spend a few days coding my one-off solution. Not sure I have the time or patience to pull that off.

I could get 60% of what I wanted if the Journal application window acted as a container for multiple notes in the container at the same time. I could get 70% of what I wanted if cardfile.exe from Windows 3.x ran on XP and supported ink. 80% if the old Tornado for Windows was still around, ran on XP and supported ink.

[Dennis Rice]

Okay guys, just to chime in here, I want to understand the application. I've never used Hypercard et al, so let me clarify what I think you are saying.

Is the concept basically that of a mini database of cards? For example, if I was studying for an MCSE exam, I would have a "stack" of virtual cards that would allow me to click somewhere, ink some data into "fields" in a template, and store the record as a "card"? If that is so, what would you do with it then? Query? Sort? ?????

Help me understand more here!

[Dennis Rice]

Okay guys, just to chime in here, I want to understand the application. I've never used Hypercard et al, so let me clarify what I think you are saying.

Is the concept basically that of a mini database of cards? For example, if I was studying for an MCSE exam, I would have a "stack" of virtual cards that would allow me to click somewhere, ink some data into "fields" in a template, and store the record as a "card"? If that is so, what would you do with it then? Query? Sort? ?????

Help me understand more here!

[Bishop]

Think of it as the application equivalent of a blank physical rolodex. Each frame or card in the stack could accept ink. Each could be configured to store ink and or data in one or more customized template fields, link to other cards, etc.

Ideally, an end user could easily configure multiple stacks for his/her own particular needs.

[Bishop]

Think of it as the application equivalent of a blank physical rolodex. Each frame or card in the stack could accept ink. Each could be configured to store ink and or data in one or more customized template fields, link to other cards, etc.

Ideally, an end user could easily configure multiple stacks for his/her own particular needs.

[Rod]

Actually, this had never occurred to me before as usseful but I think it really would be.

WHen I am doing a novel, or legal submissions of any length, as part for the process I write out physical index cards headed with say a character's name or a scene name or a storyline element or a legal topic or whateve and then pop details on to the card under that. I keep adding to them. Then, as I write, I fish out the card or several of them, lay them on the desk and check teh contenst against what I am doing on the Word processor, add add to them or change them.

I really think that a neat, snappy fast index card would be really, really useful.

With these elements:

- text and ink and h/w recog enabled
- perhaps 'stored' in a tree as in Windows Explorer
- be able to label each level of the tree
- be able to physically put them into an order within a level
- be able to drag them physically between levels
- be able to sort logically (at least alphabetically) within each level and across more than one level
- be able to physically haul them around the screen as though laying them out on the desk, three or four at a time (no matter from where they come in terms of level)
- be able to have more than one tree

I don't know how that relates to Hypercard or others.

Maybe the cards could be (or could optionally be) transparent layers. That way I could decide if they stayed on top or not and if they did, I could keep Outlook on my external monitor as I do now but lay out cards on top of it and still see what's going on in Outlook (I would be working in the W/P on the Tablet screen).

Rod

[Rod]

Actually, this had never occurred to me before as usseful but I think it really would be.

WHen I am doing a novel, or legal submissions of any length, as part for the process I write out physical index cards headed with say a character's name or a scene name or a storyline element or a legal topic or whateve and then pop details on to the card under that. I keep adding to them. Then, as I write, I fish out the card or several of them, lay them on the desk and check teh contenst against what I am doing on the Word processor, add add to them or change them.

I really think that a neat, snappy fast index card would be really, really useful.

With these elements:

- text and ink and h/w recog enabled
- perhaps 'stored' in a tree as in Windows Explorer
- be able to label each level of the tree
- be able to physically put them into an order within a level
- be able to drag them physically between levels
- be able to sort logically (at least alphabetically) within each level and across more than one level
- be able to physically haul them around the screen as though laying them out on the desk, three or four at a time (no matter from where they come in terms of level)
- be able to have more than one tree

I don't know how that relates to Hypercard or others.

Maybe the cards could be (or could optionally be) transparent layers. That way I could decide if they stayed on top or not and if they did, I could keep Outlook on my external monitor as I do now but lay out cards on top of it and still see what's going on in Outlook (I would be working in the W/P on the Tablet screen).

Rod