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Mozilla Starts Work On XForms

Posted by timothy on from the fill-in-this-blank dept.

AnamanFan writes "The Mozilla Foundation, with Novell and IBM, announced the formation to implement the W3C's XForms 1.0 Recommendation on the Mozilla platform. XForms is the forms module in XHTML 2, developed by the W3C. The project enables developers to deliver the type of next-generation, rich, portable web-based applications desired by corporate IT. Is this one step away from the corporate world's dependence on ActiveX? We can only hope."

8 of 283 comments (clear)

  1. XHTML 2? Try Web Forms 2.0... by timealterer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    XHTML 2 has a number of problems, from backwards-compatibility to human editability. A much better successor for HTML forms is Web Forms 2.0, which is also being worked on by Mozilla, as well as other major players in the industry. Obviously the real challenge is forcing Microsoft to support it.

    --
    - Allen Pike
    Altering time, one time at a time.
  2. What's really new in XForms? by osho_gg · · Score: 5, Interesting

    From the announcemnt,

    "XForms is key to realizing the vision of a future where people can access information online on any device--and do everything from shopping and banking to checking their e-mail or calendar."

    Hmmmm?? I do all that on the web - shopping, banking, email, calender - right now just fine with the current generate technology. What's really new in XForms? Is there a XForms show-case or something like that out there?

    Osho

  3. Has MS Jumped on the Bandwagon? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Sad to say it, but if Microsoft doesnt implement XForms into IE, then it doesnt have much of a future. I'm sure visitors would just LOVE to see a site error message "I'm sorry, you must download Mozilla 8.0 to view this website". Maybe for intranets it could be used, but not on the general internet.

    Has Microsoft expressed interest in implementing the standard? I hope so, since it looks pretty cool. However, it looks like MS already tackled a lot of the issues with ASP.NET (such as validation controls) so maybe they dont want to reinvent the wheel (or implement something that will help them lose one of their server platform's competitive advantages)

  4. Konqueror? by bogaboga · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Where is Konqueror in this project? Will it (Konqueror) simply follow the "leaders" as it has somewhat been in other instances? How can they get involved?

  5. [XForms] XForms is not only useful in browsers by superskippy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Like SVG for graphics, I think XForms is not only a useful concept if the browser supports it. I like the idea that I can currently create SVG on the server, render it on the server and send it to the browser as a PNG. I believe that there are currently products and projects available that if you have a set of XForms, allow you to turn them into a standard CGI-like application- all of the work of transforming into HTML etc. is done on the server.

    I hope (cross-fingers) that in the future that I can send the original SVG/XForms/whatever to browsers that support it, and render on the server for everything else.

    It's also good writing things using standards compliant products. I've currently just moved a website that relied on XSLT a lot from one software toolkit to another. This wouldn't be possible if I'd used a non-standard technology (in the sense that it worked with one toolkit only).

  6. Mozilla working XForms isn't that big a deal... by fm6 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    How many little things like this has various Mozilla people working on it? I'd say "ho hum", except that this project has the backing of two leading Open Source citizens, IBM and Novell. I surely hope this means increased recognition of the importance of web standards. There are too many specs that sound exciting, but never go anywhere, except to be described in some hard-to-read document on w3.org.

  7. Mixing technologies using XML namespaces by Nagus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    For those who didn't know this: one of the great things about XML is that it allows for the mixing of namespaces in a single document.

    This means that different XML technologies (like XHTML, SVG, MathML, and yes, XForms) can be used in a single file.

    Now if the display device (ie. browser) has support for all the used technologies, some funky things become possible.

    For example, a web page could use XHTML for structuring a document, SVG for graphics, MathML for formula display and XForms for data input.

    Throw in some scripting, and you could for example do a function plotter as a web application, in a single document.

    At this point it's not just about structured data anymore, but also about mixing-and-matching technologies to create applications. And XForms is one of the building blocks that will hopefully make this possible.

    --
    Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!... Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
  8. What about XUL? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Mozilla already has XUL (pronounced "zool" as in cool). It provides rich application ability to be served via the web. (In other words, equivalent to upcoming MS Avalon except XUL has years of use and stability.) XUL works on any computer/OS that has Mozilla or Firefox running so it is cross-platform compatible.

    Website for XUL:
    http://www.mozilla.org/projects/xul/

    Nice example application developed in XUL.
    Click on "Try MAB 1.2" to run the application.
    http://mab.mozdev.org/