As a kid I didn’t understand what the 555 timer chip on the Apple II disk controller was doing but I learned the hard way that when you misalign the pins on the drive connector cable and the 555 chip releases its blue smoke you can’t use the drive anymore :(
I hear it a lot but this gambling analogy breaks when you look at actual outcomes. If you went to Vegas and after a few pulls on a one-armed bandit could _reliably_ walk away with the jackpot we wouldn’t even call it gambling anymore.
Shameless plug for my startup’s freehand web editor https://hatch.one. You don’t have to throw back to hotglue if you want to create your own site visually with tremendous creative freedom.
Hatch (https://hatch.one) has many of the characteristics of HyperCard plus its "projects" are full featured, shareable and remixable (if you want) web pages.
- Easy drag-and-drop interface with a library of images, audio, video, etc.
- Programmable with Visual Scripting for an easy on ramp to adding logic and behaviors.
- Programmable with Javascript if that's what you want to learn.
- HTML "components" if you want to dig into HTML, CSS and all that good stuff.
- A few tutorials to help get started with physics, animation, etc.
- Free.
- Super fun! Ok, I'm highly biased as one of its creators.
This article has been such an inspiration for us at Hatch (https://hatch.one/)! We founded the company as “Personal Software” and we’re working hard to lower the barriers for this kind of creation. The opportunity shouldn't be limited to people who know how to code. Several pieces of the puzzle are in place with more in the pipleine. Here's quick video of getting started creating a web app in 60 seconds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQMFFkCHrdo
Love rough.js. Thanks Preet Shihn! I used it to create Sketchy Shapes you can add to Hatch projects. Fun to play with the parameters in realtime: https://hatch.one/@darrin/sketchy-shapes/edit
Note that, unlike Chrome, Safari only supports “origin private” files which means it cannot be used to access files already on your system (e.g. no vscode.dev, photoshop.adobe.com opening of local files).
Everybody wants a different set of App Store rules. The problem is that there is only one App Store and one company choosing the rules. With competing App Stores (e.g. “Great for Kids Store”, “Adults Only Store”) we’d have freedom of choice instead of single corporate rule.
Imagine if one company set the rules for allowable websites. What would (wouldn’t) they ban?
Instead the Web is wonderfully open and parents, schools, individuals, even nations can choose configurable filters to have a web that aligns with their values.