Google Maps Creator Takes Browsers To The Limit

An anonymous reader writes "Addressing a crowd of developers in Sydney today, Google Maps creator Lars Rasmussen encouraged them to embrace bleeding edge technology in browser software. He cited the example of how Google Maps can command Internet Explorer to use VML (Vector Markup Language by Microsoft) to display a blue line between geographical points, but use a PNG graphic format and a linear description for the Firefox browser." From the article: "Firstly, the Web allows rapid deployment and there is no software for users to install. It's also much easier to make sure code runs on multiple browsers compared with multiple operating systems like Mac OS X and Windows. The downside is that browsers don't give programmers full access to a computer's resources such as memory, process power and hard disk space. This is a bottleneck the engineer sees being removed in future, although he thinks the simplicity of the current Web browsing experience needs to be maintained."

Comments

right.....

[TheClam]

I think the answer to all of IE's problems is to give it MORE access to my PC.

But, untrue!

[Vo0k]

The downside is that browsers don't give programmers full access to a computer's resources such as memory, process power and hard disk space. This is a bottleneck the engineer sees being removed in future, although he thinks the simplicity of the current Web browsing experience needs to be maintained.

One thing where MSIE excels over Firefox is exactly providing totally unrestricted access to all the system resources of the client's system, for any website developer/programmer, even without need for confirmation from the user. Although Microsoft swears by God that this feature will be removed from IE7...

No software to install?

[szquirrel]

...and there is no software for users to install.

Except for, maybe, a web browser?

It doesn't come from browser elves, you know...

Re:No software to install?

[piquadratCH]

I'm sure Google has some sort of web based webbrowser in the pipeline. Wait...

To the Limit!

[xappax]

Everybody to the limit, google maps is to the limit...
I said co-ome on fghwgads!

Everybody to the limit!

[bornyesterday]

The Cheat is to the limit! Everybody come on fhqwdgads!

Everybody...

[Sunkist]

to the limit!

Let the serive begin

[MyLongNickName]

And to begin today's Google worship service, please open to page 152 of your hymnal. Let's begin

"Amaaaaazing Google.... is a search engine
That helps a geek like meeeeeeee
Iiiii once was lost, in the interweb
But now you've show the waaay

T'was Sergey who made the Google god
And Larry who helped him ooooout
How precious was that interface
So simple yet so compleeeeeeet

Through many popups, porn and 404's,
We have already brooooowsed
T'was Google that brought us safe thus far
and Google will lead us home.

Google has promised more to me
Like gmail, maps and blogs.
They own all of our web dayayata
But Google "does no evil"

When we've been browsing for ten hours
and don't know how to thinnnnnnk
we'll log onto Slashdot again
to hear more about Goooooogle."

-- Pastor Google

"Slashdot -- Serving freethinkers since never"

So...

[__aaclcg7560]

Support for IE7 is already broken? ;)

Re:Standards

[stuckinarut]

They should all conform to standards. Yes in and in that perfect world we'd also have standard units of measurement; currencies; plug sockets; sides of the road to drive on!

His eyes uncovered!!!!!

[lowlevel]

He cited the example of how Google Maps can command Internet Explorer to use VML (Vector Markup Language by Microsoft) to display a blue line between geographical points, but use a PNG graphic format and a linear description for the Firefox browser."

SO THATS WHY the blue line won't print in Exploder, but will when I use firefox. Thanks slashdot! :D

Re:It's All So Funny

[Idarubicin]

What was the point of Microsoft trying so hard to destroy another company and take over the market?

I dunno...habit?

Re:Surely he was misquoted? On both? ;-)

[jasenj1]

The world in general will remain stupid; you have to code around it.

I think I've found a new signature. - Jasen.

Re:Just Imagine the Advertising Potential

[ultranova]

And think of all of those poor advertisers, with starving children at home to feed.

...to their bloodthirsty attack dogs.

I protest the way you associate dogs and advertisers. Dogs have served humanity for millenias, helping hunters feed their families and guarding the results of their masters hard labor from those that would take it away. Dogs, especially bloodthirsty attack dogs, are not something advertisers keep, they are something that you keep on your property to keep the advertisers away.

Unfortunately, recent technological advantages have given the advertisers an opening past the guard dogs, with ad banners, email spam and telephone terror. However, dogs have proven to be very adaptable, and are quickly gaining the neccessary skillset to perform their job in modern society. Already they hunt drugs instead of mice and explosives instead of rabbits; I predict it won't take long until they gain sufficient computer skills to safeguard their master in his journeys in the Information Superhighway, barking ad banners apart, herding spam from the inbox to trash and breaking the neck-equivalents of viruses between their slavering jaws of digital teeth.

Indeed, dogs do not deserve to have their reputation tarnished by being associated with advertisers; please refrain from such baseless mudslinging in the future.

And in any case it is unadvisable to feed children to dogs; small finger bones may stick in their throats and choke them to death.

VRML is not VML

[SimHacker]

You have confused VRML and VML. There are completely different technologies. Look at the way they're spelled. They're different: VML. VRML. See? One uses four letters, and the other uses three. That's different! Now if you take a closer look at the letters, you will notice that one uses the letter R, while the letter R is conspicuously missing from the other. I think it's safe to say that "VML" != "VRML", and even that strcmp("VML", "VRML") != 0. (That's becauxe strcmp returns 0 if the two strings are equal, and they aren't. Now don't get me started in their relative alphabetical merit.)

-Don