LiveCode
Shares rank 6 of 7 programming environments by recommenders
Recommended as a cross-platform successor to HyperCard that can import HyperCard stacks, though critics object to its move away from an open source version.
Recommended as a cross-platform successor to HyperCard that can import HyperCard stacks, though critics object to its move away from an open source version.
8 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 5
- criticize it
- 3
- approval share
- 63%
Recommended in 3 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 5 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 1.6 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 3 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Seen as a HyperCard successor
“LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too.”
Comment from 7 Mar 2026 in “Art Bits from Apple Macintosh HyperCard” “LiveCode is an excellent replacement, at least for me.”
Comment from 26 Jul 2026 in “Decker”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Dropped its open source version
“they've discontinued the open source version and have pivoted to an AI-assisted drag and drop UI builder”
Comment from 26 Jul 2026 in “Decker” “though it gave up on opensource”
Comment from 2 Jul 2026 in “Visual Basic on the PC with Windows 3.1” “Still annoyed by the rug-pull the LiveCode folks did for their opensource version”
Comment from 22 Oct 2026 in “No more icons in every menu by default” - Comment from 4 Sep 2026 in “Project Xanadu: Even More Hindsight (2025)”
- Comment from 30 Sep 2026 in “Tcl/Tk 9.1”
- Comment from 30 Jul 2026 in “The Apple Calculator Language”
Other programming environments people recommend
The four most recommended other programming environments, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HyperCard | 62 | 5 | 93% | 11 | — | Approved |
| QBasic | 27 | 3 | 90% | 11 | — | Approved |
| QuickBASIC | 8 | 0 | 100% | 8 | — | — |
| Folk Computer | 6 | 2 | 75% | 6 | — | — |
| LiveCodeThis page | 5 | 3 | 63% | 3 | — | — |
What people said
All 12 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“Still annoyed by the rug-pull the LiveCode folks did for their opensource version”
“still salty about the license rug pull”
“the infamous "rug pull" when Live Code went closed source”
“they never seemed to get any traction w/ their HTML5 Canvas implementation”
“until their opensource rug pull”
“LiveCode is an excellent replacement, at least for me.”
“they've discontinued the open source version and have pivoted to an AI-assisted drag and drop UI builder”
“though it gave up on opensource”
“Doesn’t really seem to get “it” to be a successor, or even a new VisualBasic.”
“LiveCode is its spiritual successor IMHO. Cross platform too.”
“can import HyperCard stacks”
“drag and drop in Livecode [2] is a bit of a hack”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.