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Paul Merrell

Fight over 'forms' clouds future of Net applications | Pagalz.com - Blog - 0 views

  • As Net heavyweights vie to define the next generation of Web applications, the Web’s main standards body is facing a revolt within its own ranks over electronic forms, a cornerstone of interactive documents.
  • “The W3C is saying the answer is XForms. Microsoft is saying it’s XAML. Macromedia is saying its Flash MX. And Mozilla is saying it’s XUL.
  • Though the success of one method or another might not seem to make much difference to the person filling out an order form, the fate of open standards in the process could determine whether that form can relay the data it collects to any standards-compliant database or banking system, or whether it can only operate within certain proprietary systems. The fate of a standard could also determine whether the order form could be accessed in any standards-compliant Web browser, or if it would be available only to users of a particular operating system–an outcome that has browser makers and others worried about the role of Microsoft.
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  • browser makers still want a standards-based forms technology to help the Web steer clear of proprietary application platforms. They’re particularly concerned about Microsoft’s sprawling vision for Windows “Longhorn” applications built in the XML-based XAML markup language using Longhorn’s Avalon graphics system. Browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Opera and Apple’s Safari will be useless to access these Internet-based Windows applications.
  • “The WHAT approach works OK for small examples,” Pemberton said. “But actors like the Department of Defense say ‘no scripting.’”
  • HAT approach works OK for small examples,” Pemberton said. “But actors like the Department of Defense say ‘no scripting.’”
  • The evolution versus revolution debate over forms centers on the use of scripting–specifically JavaScript–to perform important tasks in forms-based applications.
  • “I understand where WHAT is coming from, but they are browser makers, not forms experts,” Pemberton said. “It is important to build something that is future-proof and not a Band-Aid solution. Forms (technology) is the basis of the e-commerce revolution and so it is important to do it right.”
Gary Edwards

Why Mozilla is committed to Gecko as WebKit popularity grows: Page 1 - 0 views

  • One of the primary reasons for the enormous complexity of the Gecko code base is that it aims to provide much more than just an HTML renderer. Mozilla's early goals were extremely ambitious—the original Mozilla application suite included a browser, a complete mail and newsgroup program, a web design tool, and an IRC client. In addition to rendering HTML, Gecko also provides a versatile XML-based user interface rendering framework called XUL that was used extensively in those applications. XUL is still used today to create the Firefox user interface, and it facilitates that browser's support for extensions, which are regarded by many enthusiasts as one of the most valuable features offered by Firefox.
  • XPCOM, a powerful component system
  • Gecko 1.9 uses the cross-platform Cairo rendering framework.
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  • reflow algorithm
  • Firefox 4 and replaces XPCOM reference counting with real garbage collection
  • support for some CSS 3 features that are implemented in WebKit.
  • TraceMonkey engine landed in recent nightly builds and will likely be included in 3.1; it massively boosts JavaScript performance
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    The consensus of the developers who are using WebKit is clear: it's an outstanding rendering engine that lends itself to an extremely diverse assortment of practical uses. It is everywhere, and it is gaining traction at a very impressive rate. That traction is causing some developers to question whether Mozilla's Gecko rendering engine is still relevant.
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    Historical walkthrough comparing two great rendering engines (layout); Mozilla Gecko and WebKit.
Gary Edwards

Nokia and Google: Too much emphasis on the mobile OS? | ge TalkBack on ZDNet - 0 views

  • Although it appears that the mobile hardware providers are competing through the development of incompatible platforms, i think there's reason to be hopeful. There seems to be movement towards a universal web application model able to join legacy Web with an Open-Web future where devices, desktops, web-stacks, and clouds connect, access, exchange and collaborate with all kinds of information systems. Above the metal, at the web application layer, there is a war between competing runtime engines. The recent Web 2.0 Conference was a showcase for Sun Java FX, Adobe RiA, and Microsoft .NET Silverlight. The exhibitors floor featured a large and prominent Microsoft Silverlight-Mesh island surrounded by Flex RiA providers, with currents of IT and developers asking the same question; Can Adobe run with Microsoft?
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    Interesting discussion about a universal web application layer able to wrok across devices, browsers and web service systems. I reponded with a very lengthy post about WebKit.
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Gary Edwards

SVG Is The Future Of Application Development | SitePoint » - 0 views

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    I could see this coming a mile away, ana it's about time! ".... So if HTML can't deliver for us here, what will? Microsoft wants us to use Silverlight and Adobe wants us to use Flash and AIR, of course. And Apple…? Apple ostensibly wants us to use HTML5's canvas. Both Microsoft's and Adobe's contenders are proprietary, which seems to be reason enough for web developers to avoid them to a certain degree, and all of them muddy HTML, which is a dangerous thing for the semantic web. But Apple actually has a trick up its sleeve. Like Mozilla's been doing with Firefox, Apple has quietly been implementing better support for SVG, the W3C's Recommendation for XML-based vector graphics, into WebKit. SVG delivers the same kind of vector graphics capabilities that Flash does, but it does so using all the interoperability benefits that XML brings along for the ride. SVG is great for graphically displaying both text and images, manipulating them with declarative visual primitives, and it comes with a host of lickable effects. Ironically, SVG was originally jointly developed by both Adobe and Sun Microsystems but recently it's Sun Labs that has been doing interesting stuff with the technology. The most compelling experiment of this kind has to be Sun Labs's Lively Kernel project....."
Gary Edwards

Word 2007 XAML Generator - Home - 0 views

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    The OOXML <> XAML "fixed/flow" converter firs tappeared in the December 2007 MSOffice beta SDK. Now it's an easy to install MSOffice plug-in. So, where's that port of XUL to WebKit?
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    Project Description A Word 2007 Add-in that converts the Office Open XML (WordprocessingML) to XAML: For WPF, the document is converted into a FlowDocument element. For Silverlight 2 the document is converted into a StackPanel element containing TextBlock elements.
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