{"slug": "livecode", "name": "LiveCode", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "", "recommenders": 3, "commenters": 4, "warners": 2, "score": -0.003, "rising": -0.98, "first": "2025-12-27", "latest": "2026-09-30", "why": "LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 1, "compare": 1, "warn": 2}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too.", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "livecode.com", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://livecode.com", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["LiveCode"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 780087664, "item_id": 48755479, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48755479", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "there's still LiveCode (though it gave up on opensource)", "excerpt": "Funny, you'd think the idea of a graphical version of BASIC would have come to mine when he bought MacBasic for $1: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html For my part, I've decided that my next project will probably be done in PureBasic/SpiderBasic, and that if I then feel the need for pure opensource goodness I'll port it Gambas. That said, if one wants HyperCard on the Mac (or Windows) there's still LiveCode (thoug", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Visual Basic on the PC with Windows 3.1"}, {"id": 756572017, "item_id": 47285751, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47285751", "by": "tomcam", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too.", "excerpt": "LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too. https://livecode.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Cross-platform app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Art Bits from Apple Macintosh HyperCard"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 798458369, "item_id": 49903648, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49903648", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-09-30", "stance": "warn", "quote": "still salty about the license rug pull", "excerpt": "It was nice/workable for its time, and one wishes that there was some modern alternative, but \"RAD\" seems to have dropped off the radar. Some things I've tried/looked into (beyond TCL/TK): - Gambas --- Linux only, not sure if there's a nice visual UI builder - LiveCode --- still salty about the license rug pull, wish the openxtalk folks could get some traction - MoonBasic --- looks promising, but currently trying....", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tcl/Tk 9.1"}, {"id": 793062641, "item_id": 49566415, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49566415", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-09-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the infamous \"rug pull\" when Live Code went closed source", "excerpt": "Sure! Until the stack got too large, or one forgot the ID of the card one wanted to link to or the search text which would allow one to make it a target, &c. HyperCard was _amazing_ (and I still have my copy of _The Manhole: Where Alice would have gone if Alice had HyperCard_ which was the predecessor for _Myst_) and it kills me that we lost MacBasic: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html and that HyperCard was such", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Project Xanadu: Even More Hindsight (2025)"}, {"id": 785742114, "item_id": 49108882, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49108882", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-07-30", "stance": "warn", "quote": "until their opensource rug pull", "excerpt": "Or, what Jef Raskin would have thought of MacBasic: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html Agree w/ the page author's fondness for RealBasic --- still have a copy of _BASIC for Windows 3.0_ which had a copy of it on a floppy disk (and a nifty graphical poker game as an example). Xojo is alive and well, though I haven't been able to justify a license, (diverted to HyperCard and Runtime Revolution which became LiveCode", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Apple Calculator Language"}, {"id": 742479633, "item_id": 46404977, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46404977", "by": "gcanyon", "date": "2025-12-27", "stance": "warn", "quote": "drag and drop in Livecode [2] is a bit of a hack", "excerpt": "I maintain Navigator, a development tool I started over twenty years ago; I am the only contributor to the open source repository [1]. I have rewritten drag and drop in that thing four times (because drag and drop in Livecode [2] is a bit of a hack). It's a pain every time. I'm not rewriting it again. 1. https://github.com/gcanyon/navigator 2. https://livecode.com", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Publishing your work increases your luck"}]}], "who": [{"by": "gnodar", "context": "retired software engineer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49065001", "date": "2026-07-26"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["personal applications", "cross-platform app development", "hypercard-style app development"], "compared": [{"slug": "hypercard", "name": "HyperCard", "co": 2, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "openxtalk", "name": "OpenXTalk", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49896712", "title": "Tcl/Tk 9.1", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49559522", "title": "Project Xanadu: Even More Hindsight (2025)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49107437", "title": "The Apple Calculator Language", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49060856", "title": "Decker", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48711565", "title": "Visual Basic on the PC with Windows 3.1", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47281485", "title": "Art Bits from Apple Macintosh HyperCard", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {"warn": 1}, "2026-01": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {"compare": 1}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {"warn": 1}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 798458369, "item_id": 49903648, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49903648", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-09-30", "stance": "warn", "quote": "still salty about the license rug pull", "excerpt": "It was nice/workable for its time, and one wishes that there was some modern alternative, but \"RAD\" seems to have dropped off the radar. Some things I've tried/looked into (beyond TCL/TK): - Gambas --- Linux only, not sure if there's a nice visual UI builder - LiveCode --- still salty about the license rug pull, wish the openxtalk folks could get some traction - MoonBasic --- looks promising, but currently trying....", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tcl/Tk 9.1"}, {"id": 793062641, "item_id": 49566415, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49566415", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-09-04", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the infamous \"rug pull\" when Live Code went closed source", "excerpt": "Sure! Until the stack got too large, or one forgot the ID of the card one wanted to link to or the search text which would allow one to make it a target, &c. HyperCard was _amazing_ (and I still have my copy of _The Manhole: Where Alice would have gone if Alice had HyperCard_ which was the predecessor for _Myst_) and it kills me that we lost MacBasic: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html and that HyperCard was such", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Project Xanadu: Even More Hindsight (2025)"}, {"id": 785742114, "item_id": 49108882, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49108882", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-07-30", "stance": "warn", "quote": "until their opensource rug pull", "excerpt": "Or, what Jef Raskin would have thought of MacBasic: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html Agree w/ the page author's fondness for RealBasic --- still have a copy of _BASIC for Windows 3.0_ which had a copy of it on a floppy disk (and a nifty graphical poker game as an example). Xojo is alive and well, though I haven't been able to justify a license, (diverted to HyperCard and Runtime Revolution which became LiveCode", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Apple Calculator Language"}, {"id": 785040016, "item_id": 49065001, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49065001", "by": "gnodar", "date": "2026-07-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "", "excerpt": "The OpenXTalk community is keeping the open source version alive. https://www.openxtalk.org/", "context": "retired software engineer", "use_case": "Personal applications", "switched_from": "HyperCard", "story": "Decker"}, {"id": 780087664, "item_id": 48755479, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48755479", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "there's still LiveCode (though it gave up on opensource)", "excerpt": "Funny, you'd think the idea of a graphical version of BASIC would have come to mine when he bought MacBasic for $1: https://www.folklore.org/MacBasic.html For my part, I've decided that my next project will probably be done in PureBasic/SpiderBasic, and that if I then feel the need for pure opensource goodness I'll port it Gambas. That said, if one wants HyperCard on the Mac (or Windows) there's still LiveCode (thoug", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Visual Basic on the PC with Windows 3.1"}, {"id": 756572017, "item_id": 47285751, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47285751", "by": "tomcam", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too.", "excerpt": "LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too. https://livecode.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Cross-platform app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Art Bits from Apple Macintosh HyperCard"}, {"id": 752975696, "item_id": 47060981, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47060981", "by": "gnodar", "date": "2026-02-18", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Looks like a less feature-full version of livecode", "excerpt": "Looks like a less feature-full version of livecode [0], which I'd argue is more of a HyperCard successor\", since they were formerly revolution & MetaCard, and can import HyperCard stacks. [0] https://livecode.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "HyperCard-style app development", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Breadboard \u2013 a modern HyperCard for building web apps on the canvas"}, {"id": 745700784, "item_id": 46606299, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46606299", "by": "WillAdams", "date": "2026-01-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "re-naming their Hypercard clone as", "excerpt": "Funny how this has co-opted the Runtime Revolution folks re-naming their Hypercard clone as: https://livecode.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Tulip Creative Computer"}, {"id": 742479633, "item_id": 46404977, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46404977", "by": "gcanyon", "date": "2025-12-27", "stance": "warn", "quote": "drag and drop in Livecode [2] is a bit of a hack", "excerpt": "I maintain Navigator, a development tool I started over twenty years ago; I am the only contributor to the open source repository [1]. I have rewritten drag and drop in that thing four times (because drag and drop in Livecode [2] is a bit of a hack). It's a pain every time. I'm not rewriting it again. 1. https://github.com/gcanyon/navigator 2. https://livecode.com", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Publishing your work increases your luck"}]}