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Google Maps Creator Takes Browsers To The Limit

Posted by Zonk on from the looking-down-from-above dept.

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."

4 of 316 comments (clear)

  1. Surely he was misquoted? On both? ;-) by garcia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

    Isn't that what started the downfall of browsers in the first place? The fact that malicious code could be executed client side by attackers through websites? I have a feeling that either the quote isn't written in its entirety or was modified in some way that changed what Rasmussen originally intended. I really doubt that someone of his level wouldn't acknowledge the dangers in doing what that quote proposes.

    "It's quite good," he grudgingly admitted.

    Luckily Google came out with it first so Microsoft again looks like the one copying what others are doing - right? ;-)

  2. Danger Danger Will Robinson! by ChillyWillie · · Score: 5, Insightful
    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
    Are you kidding me? How is this a bad thing? If this was allowed it would be one of the greatest security holes of all time!
    --
    I am NOT putting my signature in this stupid little box! How do I know you won't steal my identity???
  3. It's All So Funny by Comatose51 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So Microsoft initially missed the boat on the Internet. They go on to spend enormous sums of money to destroy Netscape and win the browser war. Once the war is over, what do they do? Nothing. They let the technology stagnate. It ends up being a 3rd company, Google, a non-participant in the browser war who comes along and pushes the envelope. What was the point of Microsoft trying so hard to destroy another company and take over the market? I think Google's play nice strategy is paying more dividends than MS's destroy all competitor strategy.

    --
    EvilCON - Made Famous by /.
  4. Re:Important to remember... by garcia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Before people start complaining, it is important to remember that google maps is still at this juncture considered beta.

    Who's complaining? The software works remarkably well and is probably one of the most innovative web applications ever. The fact that it requires no client side program and that it works so incredibly smooth is what makes it amazing...

    Yeah, it's not as great as it could be but they are currently taking the appropriate steps to make sure that it continues to lead the field (i.e. the API).