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Path: utzoo!dciem!nrcaer!cognos!roberts
From: roberts@cognos.uucp (Robert Stanley)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: hypertext vs. hypercards
Message-ID: <1555@cognos.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 12-Oct-87 16:54:14 EDT
Article-I.D.: cognos.1555
Posted: Mon Oct 12 16:54:14 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 14-Oct-87 04:35:10 EDT
References: <689@ufcsg.cis.ufl.EDU> <6421@apple.UUCP>
Reply-To: roberts@cognos.UUCP (Robert Stanley)
Organization: Cognos Inc., Ottawa, Canada
Lines: 30
Summary: HyperCard is not real hypertext

In article <6421@apple.UUCP> keith@apple.UUCP (Keith Rollin) writes:

>There are 2 methods suggested in the 1st and only issue of Windoid, Apple's
>Hypercard User Group's informal publication (it was posted here a couple of 
>weeks ago).

>Method #1: Place a tansparent button over the word in question, or an 
>           asterisk button after it. This has the advantage of not being
>           ambiguous, but it is not flexible (i.e. the button doesn't move
>           with the text, as in a scrolling field).

there is one really serious problem with this approach, and that is that the
font in which the text is displayed must not be altered.  I ran into this in
a big way with the first distributed version of HyperCard, where the help
stack uses a transparent button over a text asterisk to link to additional
information.  Whatever font the help stack used, I don't appear to have on
my system, and the asterisks displayed with only the most casual of relation
to the position of the buttons!  Absolutely baffling to a novice user.

You can, however, write scripts capable of detecting specifici lines, words,
and words within lines, but it gets to be a lot of programming, and is also
susceptible to font changes (number of words per line changes).

This is clearly one for Bill Atkinson, to allow a LIVE word within a text
string to be used as a sub-button or sub-field.
-- 
Robert Stanley           Cognos Incorporated     S-mail: P.O. Box 9707
Voice: (613) 738-1440 (Research: there are 2!)           3755 Riverside Drive 
  FAX: (613) 738-0002    Compuserve: 76174,3024          Ottawa, Ontario 
 uucp: decvax!utzoo!dciem!nrcaer!cognos!roberts          CANADA  K1G 3Z4