Marc Canter (founder of MacroMind/MacroMedia) one explained to me something revealing about the Director timeline (their original product before Flash, later integrated with the web browser as Shockwave):
It's essentially just a BASIC program rotated 90 degrees on its side, full of GOTOs.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35652164
DonHopkins on April 21, 2023 | parent | context | favorite | on: Show HN: Thoughts on Flash in 2023, in Flash, in 2...
I love all the amazing inspirational open source examples of generative procedural art and artificial life that Jared Tarbell published on his web site https://web.archive.org/web/20070202025610/http://levitated.... .
It opened my eyes to using Flash for procedural graphics and simulations, instead of just using timelines like a glorified graphical player piano, or like a BASIC program full of GOTO spaghetti rotated 90 degrees counter clockwise (which is how Macromedia founder Marc Canter described Director's Lingo, which also used frame numbers like BASIC line numbers).
Jared went on to do a lot more amazing stuff in Processing, co-founded Etsy, and built a toy factory!
https://www.artnome.com/news/2020/8/24/interview-with-genera...
https://www.artnome.com/news/2018/8/8/why-love-generative-ar...
https://beyondtellerrand.com/events/dusseldorf-2018/speakers...