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HyperNext Studio is a visual software development system that allows hobbyists, students and educators to quickly create cross-platform programs. It includes HyperNext Creator, Developer and Player. The Creator builds programs for Windows XP/Vista, Macintosh OS X/OS 9. It also builds cross-platform stacks that run on our freeware HyperNext Player. The Developer builds plugins/libraries that extend the functionality of Creator. The HyperNext interface is quick and easy to use with just one design window and a tool bar. It has three modes, Design, Preview and Run, and its programming language is easy to learn with English-like commands and variables not requiring their type or structure to be declared.The trial version of HyperNext Creator can create, save, load and run projects. A generous educational site license allows installation of HyperNext on an unlimited number of Macintosh and Windows educational computers.The full version allows stacks, standalone programs and plugins to be built, and is only available by Direct Download.
This review was originally posted on VersionTracker.com.<br />Ease of use
From their description HyperNext sounds very much like HyperCard and when the Creator is first loaded up it does indeed have some similarities. For example, buttons, fields and backgrounds are easy to add to cards. There are differences though and once you start creating some software these show up. Its not possible to load or convert HyperCard stacks as the language syntax is quite different and this makes it difficult, if not impossible to migrate HyperCard software.
The Card metaphor of software creation is easy to grasp and for many types of software will be a natural way to go. HyperNext is clearly aimed at beginners and if you take a beginners viewpoint then HyperNext make sense. Its debatable though how this will scale up for large software projects.
Using HyperNext is quite easy and I like the way a card can be pre-viewed to see the runtime layout. Even better, the Command + R keys run the project within the Creator so allowing rapid development. Unlike HyperCard, HyperNext cannot run a specific card and always starts with the Home card. The interface is getting better but could still do with some tidying up. I have a registered version and building a final stack or application is simply done from the menu. Stacks can be small, just a few kilobytes but applications are very large starting at about 9 MB.
Language
This is something you will probably either love or hate. Its easy to get started but most programmers, including myself, prefer stricter control of variable declarations. HyperNext variable declarations donâ??t have types and can be placed anywhere within a script which can lead to sloppy programming. On the other hand if you are a beginner and just want to get things running then this might be fine as it allows scripts to be quickly built. On the downside it must make maintainance difficult for large projects. Learning the HyperNext language is made easier by the online help on the menu bar but like the documentation it needs improving. It has sections on just about everything but often the keywords only have a simple description and often donâ??t include examples.
Expandability
They donâ??t say how large projects can be although 2 billion cards is mentioned somwhere. As with HyperCard, AppleScripts can be run from within HyperNext but the AppleScript project/stack demo doesnâ??t explain much. An interesting feature is REALbasic scripting where sections of code can written in REALbasic and run at high speed within HyperNext, again the demo stack doesnâ??t explain much. HyperNext can be expanded using the HyperNext Developer which writes plugins for the Creator. Allowing third parties to easily add extensions to HyperNext seems a great idea.
Reliability
Early versions had many bugs both in the HyperNext language and in the script editor. This latest version, 1.12, seems to have finally sorted these out and so far I havenâ??t had any crashes or encountered any more bugs. Earlier versions had an external editor which was very cumbersome whereas the new editor is quick and easy to use although its find/replace is still restricted to the current script and cannot perform global find/replace. The editor also has no syntax coloring and so looks dated even though the text/paper colors can be changed. The script editor is automatically invoked when a compile error is detected but some error messages are hard to understand.
Documentation
The documentation is a weak point and really needs improving. The QuickStart PDF guide only covers the basics and still does not give a list of keywords. If you need the keyord list then you have to use the online help.
Cost
For personal use the price of $24.95 seems right especially when compared to most other software creation tools which several times this.
Conclusions
A good attempt at giving beginners access to programming but HyperNext does need more examples and better documentation.
Pros
Easy access to programming for beginners.
Powerful and expandable.
Priced right.
Cons
Weak documentation, especially for beginners.
Few examples and demo stacks available.
Like hypercard, only completely different, and not...
Brennan Young
Pros
Cons
Summary
...as good<br />This review was originally posted on VersionTracker.com.<br />While I applaud the initiative, I wonder why anyone would use this oddball instead of pretty much anything else. It might have inherited some of the structures of hypercard, but you can't test your project directly in authoring - there's some kind of 'compile' step. Horrible non-standard GUI, for example the scripting GUI hides the layout windows. You have to run one app for coding and another one for layout.
With the chosen name they are inviting comparison with hypercard, but this will not appeal to *Card users at all. It is very far from the Hypercard development cycle. I'm all for new and diverse authoring tools - the more the merrier - but I don't get this at all. It's almost like IDEs were never invented.
Maybe if they could integrate all the various components into a single app it might have a chance. As it is, xCode/Appelscript studio is free, and actually easier to use, metacard/Runrev/supercard/faceSpan are all truer to the Hypercard metaphor.
