For much of this decade, Web browsing has been dominated by Microsoft's
Internet Explorer (IE), which at its height achieved market share numbers
approaching 95%, with the result that Microsoft owned a de facto standard for
the Web and held effective veto power over the future of HTML. During much of
this period, Microsoft suspended development of IE, with the result that
virtually no new features appeared within the world's dominant browser from
2001 to 2006.
But while IE was sleeping, one of the biggest phenomena of the computer age
happened: Ajax. Clever Web developers discovered gold in them there mountains.
Using Ajax techniques, Web developers could create desktop-like rich user
interfaces right in the browser. Not only that, Ajax was evolutionary. Ajax
offered an incremental path from the industry's existing HTML-based
infrastructure and know-how, allowing Web developers to add rich Ajax elements
to an existing HTML page.
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Many people think that the Apple WebKit-Safari-iPhone innovations are pushing Open Web Standards beyond beyond the limits of "Open", and deep into the verboten realm of vendor specific extensions. Others, myself included, believe that the WebKit community has to do this if Open Web technologies are to be anyway competitive with Microsoft's RiA (XAML-Silverlight-WPF).
Adobe RiA (AiR-Flex-Flash) is also an alternative to WebKit and Microsoft RiA; kind of half Open Web, half proprietary though. Adobe Flash is of course proprietary. While Adobe AiR implements the WebKit layout engine and visual document model. I suspect that as Adobe RiA loses ground to Microsoft Silverlight, they will open up Flash. But that's not something the Open Web can afford to wait for.
In many ways, WebKit is at the cutting edge of Ajax Open Web technologies. The problems of Ajax not scaling well are being solved as shared JavaScript libraries continue to amaze, and the JavaScript engines roar with horsepower. Innovations in WebKit, even the vendor-device specific ones, are being picked up by the JS Libraries, Firefox, and the other Open Web browsers.
At the end of the day though, it is the balance between the ACiD3 test on one side and the incredible market surge of WebKit smartphones, countertops, and netbook devices at the edge of the Web that seem to hold things together.
The surge at the edge is washing back over the greater Web, as cross-browser frustrated Web designers and developers roll out the iPhone welcome. Let's hope the ACiD3 test holds. So far it's proving to be a far more important consideration for maintaining Open Web interop, without sacrificing innovation, than anything going on at the stalled W3C.
"..... Safari continues to lead the way, implementing