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Online Ajax Pages The New Web Desktop?
SphereOfInfluence writes "With our existing models for operating environments aging badly, how do we manage our information and software as we get increasingly mobile and short on attention? In a ZDNet piece, Dion Hinchcliffe discusses the rise of the new dynamic, online, roaming Ajax desktops like Netvibes, Live.com, Protopage, and Pageflakes. Will concerns about privacy and reliability kill these or is this the wave of the future?"
Although cool and nifty, who is really going to want a remote desktop which governments can potentially access at their free will? Especially nowadays with lax wiretap laws and the like.
But this solution has also it's own problem, like all the earlier attempts, in this case the problem is a lot about security and secrecy.
When these applications start to be sold to companies to run on the company's own servers, some of the problems do go away ofcourse..
Oh dear, its only a short article and its got "leverage" and
"rich" (as in experience). Pass the sick bucket. Still, I
persevered. Not sure why I bothered. Seems like just another
snake oil "evangelist" (he missed that one) trying to flog yet
more CPU sucking eye candy that will have a large impact on your
computers power consumption but a small impact on how much more
usable the web will be. Is it just me? Is there really something
wrong with clear, simple HTML pages that load quickly without all
this flash/ajax/flavour-of-the-month-tool crap shoved in just to
please web fashion victims?
scnr
Netvibes, Protopage, Pageflakes, Live.com, and a bonus Google Personalized
Ah hypertext links. What wonders have Tim Burners Lee wrought. And look, I'm anonymous so no karma whoring.
I think Google and Gmail illustrate the limits of online apps (that would include Ajax as well as any other remote system). I see three basic issues:
* I (like many others) use mail as a general information storage system. And whenever I'm offline, that information is unavailable. And yes, offline still happens quite regularily - there's still plenty of trains, planes, trainstations and airports, hotels and conference venues that don't have it, have it but at ridiculous cost, or have it but some random component is down leaving everyone offline.
I need to have data cached locally - but if I'm going to have a local solution set up anyways I might as well go with that and avoid the hassle.
* If I leave data at Google (or some other off-site organization), my data integrity is only as good as their security. That is something I do not have any control over and (as has been demonstrated) even supposedly very security conscious companies regularily goof.
* Google and Yahoo have amply demonstrated a third issue: jurisdiction. If I have information stored with Google, I may suddenly be exposed to liability and possible data seizures in both my own country as well as Googles base country (USA at this time). If I am a company owner, do I really need the headache of reading up on data retention minutiae for a country on a different continent?
As a private citizen, there are today plenty of books and audio recordings that are in the public domain in Europe but not in the US. Also, rules about fair use are different. If I store an mp3 of an early Elvis recording in a service run by a company that is based in the US, will I get hit by a lawsuit, or have my (perfectly legal) recording deleted with no warning? I do not need that headache.
I think these kind of apps really will find their niche as internally run company-wide systems, where you have control, not primarily as the kind of third-party enterprises we usually talk about.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
Add other portable apps and what else do you need? More storage space? How about a 20GB media player? Iriver works for me.
I used to think this would be the future, but my views on that has changed. Lately, it's been very obvious that any script-kiddie with control of a sufficient amount of compromised machines (zombies) can ddos any webserver, almost regardless of the capacity of the datacenter.
His point basically was that MS will bulldoze its version of an Internet desktop to become standard, with their famous attention to security. Maybe overstated a tad, but nowhere in the current FA were the issues of data security, from accident, malice, government, hackers, big companies... addressed.
Will concerns about privacy and reliability kill these or is this the wave of the future?
If you think reliability is likely to kill this, I have two questions for you:
1. When was the last time Google stopped working?
2. When was the last time Windows stopped working?
The simple fact is that a single centrally administered server farm is vastly easier to administrate -- and will be vastly more reliable -- than a hundred million home PCs, most of which are managed by people who are vastly less competent than the average server farm administrator. Of course, if Windows broke and your home PC isn't working, you won't be able to use it to connect to sites online; but this isn't much of a problem. People care far more about their data than their hardware; if all else fails, they can borrow a friend's terminal.
Privacy and security, on the other hand, are much more serious issues; but (sadly) I don't think they have much chance of stopping something like this. Computer security is something which most people simply don't understand.
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
And that is someone will proclaim THE REVOLUTION THAT WILL CHANGE EVERYTHING FOREVER at least once every three months
If you rely on webapps exclusively, you can't reach your information all the time. Your internet connection could drop out, or you could be someplace without an internet connection (wardriving might be easy, but I never find an open access point when I need one).
Webapps complement regular apps, they don't replace them. It's good that websites are finally feeling more like real applications, and it's nice to be able to reach your information from everywhere, but they'll never replace them completely.
Why does one technology have to kill the other technology? Both can coexist fine. I use Gmail, but I still use Thunderbird to read and send my e-mail when I'm at my computer.
Online Ajax Pages The New Web Desktop?
I think I'd be happy to see this... as long as the Internet transfer speeds would equal that of a hard drive, and I wouldn't have to pay just to stay online and do my work.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
No.
8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
General consumers do not care about privacy until they get bit by it or a "trustworthy" news agency makes it sound like the whole world will collapse.
That's not really being stupid - just relativly uneducated and most people are too busy with other things to really think it through. I talk people out of using this type of stuff all the time - simply tell them how it can be abused. Until then they usually just look at the marketing hype about how useful it is when it works.
The first major public group that looses something important through a lack of privacy and it will stop. Just as people didn't lock doors at the turn of the century (who cared about privacy?) once it was obvious it was going to be taken advantage of it changed. Though it will probably swing back too far the other way in trusting almost nothing.
But hey, maybe they will fix thier privacy issues too, it *could* happen.
------- Sorry about the spelling, I suffer from two problems. Dyslexia makes it difficult to spell well, lazy makes it
The problem with AJAX as I see it is that it is a bit of a Kludge.
Why did XUL never take off? I think that is a really interesting technology, much better than AJAX, but I guess being mozilla only it will never really reach mainstream? I guess it wouldn't be possible to create a XUL plug-in for IE?
I could just imagine a blind person listening to his/her Web 2.0 Desktop. Web 2.0 is b.s. unless used wisely under normal usability standards. And as far as I'm concerned, Ajax desktops are still a pipe dream. Get widgets, get a mac.
But please make your ajax scripts available through https or half of the corporate users won't ever stand half a chance of seeing your 'loading please wait' splash screen...
Hint: https://mail.google.com/mail (thanks google)
Get our network infrastructure updated so we can connect via remote desktop, vnc, etc. and have a useable connection to our home systems.
Although I do think, Ajax with javascript/dhtml is pretty cool, it's a bit overkill to think that it will be the "desktop" platform of the future. My beef would be an idea of a secondary application layer (only logical, not literal) over OS and within browser application framework. The shared load between Javascript JIT compilation and native applications to make Ajax application smooth, stable and functional would be hard to implement especially for portable PDAs with underpower processors and limited memory and buffer cache. Not to mention Ajax applications will always have to be confined within browser application, not able to compete with multithreaded and compiled bytecode applications.
j s.html
Try benchmark Javascript against your machine here;
http://www.24fun.com/downloadcenter/benchjs/bench
I think, for web "desktop" to be successful and attractive for "users," the web browser platform itself has to change dramatically to give Ajax applications an development edge and ability to compete with native applications. Otherwise similar fate of Java Applets may be ahead for Ajax.
"Don't let fools fool you. They are the clever ones."
Not like we have a WHOLE load of privacy online or offline now, your PC is under the jurisdiction of the government if they so wish to search it, what's the difference with storing it online?
Even if you encrypt it you have to give up the key or go to jail.
Why not just sit in your tin-foil hat with a copy of DBAN boot-and-nuke in the drive ready at all times..
Share your Knowlege - Kung-Fu Geekery
Odd conclusion? Well no. They are expensive but that is because they do not actually have a datalimit, or rather you have one 100gb on my account but they don't actually measure your data throughput. Tiscali does and the limit is 1gb for half the price. Mmmm. 40 bucks for 1gb or 80 for unlimited.
Next is that their helpdesk is always busy, this is nasty but at least the helpdesk fucking knows their business AND is available in the weekend. Oh and their online help is good enough that the only thing I ever needed from them is password resets.
So who cares about this? Is this on topic? Well no but I am getting there. Next is reliability. I said xs4all sucks? Well it does, it always managed to drop my connection at least once per month. Fucking annoying.
Offcourse that was until I moved house and now am on tiscali. Wich drops the con every 10 minutes. Suddenly the internet is totally different. Even simple browsing becomes a pain when every 4th click results in a minute long wait for the modem to reconnect.
Why is it crap? Oh who knows. I actually have worked for tiscali (then worldonline) in the distant past and they never struck me as the brightest bulb (they hired me after all) but perhaps it is just the phone line.
But it really doesn't matter. On my old con it was already troublesome that a couple of times per year I could not google or whatever but with this ISP can you imagine using web apps? It would be like trying to do work on windows 95 adware edition.
And that is my fundemental, and I think everyone elses, problem with the whole idea of webapps. Very nice until your connection drops out.
As long as we got joke ISP's with idiotic data limits web apps are never going to take off. Think of it like this. Who here does not have some kind of emergency equipment like a flashlight for when the elec drops out or camping gas stove for when the gas drops out? And that is (at least in holland) extremely reliable stuff. Trusting my internet connection to determine wether I can work or not does not sound very smart to me.
Oh and as far as mobile computing is concerned. Those who can afford mobile connection costs don't need it, they got secretaries and those who need it can't afford it.
You can forget the net 2.0 the same problem that killed the 'bubble' ideas of the net are killing any new ideas. The ISP's simply ain't up to the task of providing reliable constant connections. Oh the better ones come close but xs4all in holland is tiny. The best and reviewed that way by consumer organisations but still tiny.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
"roaming Ajax desktops"
I swear that statement would scare my mother.
We've all heard over the last few years that Microsoft et al want to move all their software to a subscription model. Gone will be the days when you pay for a piece of software once and it just works for a very long time. This isn't going to happen overnight, but this all ties together and that's where these guys want this to go. Thank god for F/OSS.
sh has aged very well, thank you very much.
Theres a good thing about remote applications
if theres a security bug,
ALL the clients can be fixed in ONE update
none of that microsoft / symantec patching every so often business
The problem I see with AJAX technologies is that almost none of them have been put to any good -use-. Everyone keeps talking about the 'potential' of such applications, the 'implications' AJAX-like setups can have for software and desktops.... But how many actually -useful- applications do I use a day? What, Gmail? Every now and then when I get directions or I'm board enough to check the satallite photos, Google Maps. And really, those things are the cream of the crop for AJAX applications. Most other sites integrate AJAX in a small way, ways that are helpful and I'm sure appreciated by their users, but nothing earth shattering and certainly nothing that ushers in the obvious defeat of the modern desktop as we know it. Most of these things are subtle improvements on an existing platform.
Frankly I would be both a bit suprised and pissed if the user interface of webpages -didn't- evolve into something much more responsive and a bit more slick. Am I the only one who sees this as a completely expected progression and not the eXTreM3 R3V0LUTION 3.0??
I understand AJAX from a technical perspective, I've made a few "AJAX" applications myself, I just don't see the results and the real world practicality to back up the absurd wave of hype. Consider me slightly amused and half-interested until I see the types of applications that fundamentally shift the ways I'm using this machine as I've been promised.
I'm new to the business world and particuarily the business/marketing aspects of software developement and website design, but do all industries act like this? Am I getting bent out of shape over nothing, or is the hyperbole really hitting the roof on this one?
"Progress comes from the intelligent use of experience."
Security aside, is there a good ajax word processor with internationalization support ? I'd like to see a french dictionary, the two I tried were english only...
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
I must be the only person under the age of 25 who hates the advent of all this "Web 2.0" Ajax stuff. I grew up around computers despite being young now, even as a small child, and they were more of a tinkering toy than a game machine or a tool to get on the internet in the mid-90's. I witnessed the rise and fall of the first internet wave, I played with alot of technologies when they were brand new, laughed at the stupidity of those who waited out in line to get Windows 95. Even the browser wars, but I digress, because I guess these things aren't important.
I suppose the meaning of this comment is that the ugly webpages and first gigantic annoying ads, and Cnet's pages, all that, were just plain old HTML (mostly). Why can't we go back to that? Just content, no neat looking flash, no CSS layouts that are manipulated just so, that when you scroll the page the colors kinda change. Provided these "technologies" are useful and they themselves aren't bad (maybe except flash), but their media overrated-ness and even their usability aggrevates me. Every time I go onto one of these new Web 2.0 sites it's like making yourself at home in a Windows install. Overwhelming, too many things to click. I guess I'm just old-fashioned and bitter. Or I want my scrolling marquees back.
space is pretty cool.
I can garantee, this will not be a panacea for those of us who do not want to be 'computer savvy' and have to mess around installing software, or maintaining it. It is just as easy to get digitally-screwed with online content whether it's your desktop or your pay-pal account. One good thing is that it's another option in the desktop area. We need more of those.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
What you're meant to catch on to is the Office live connection. Subtle, but it's still Microsoft PR from the master of Microsoft PR.
I'm sick sick sick to see HTTP+HTML+JS used for APPLICATIONS instead of a thin client. Browsers make horrible thin clients, and HTML+HTTP+JS is a horrible way to write remote applications for thin clients. Some solution that was designed from the start for this purpose would be so much better. HTML+HTTP should be used for information transfer and PRESENTATION, not applications... To bad- while Microsoft controls desktop, this isn't going to change.
.NET
Sun did have a shot at this with java, but they failed horribly, and this opportunity is lost forever. It's a shame, i'd like to see java dominating desktop application programming, not
Oh, and one more thing. If all (ok, most) applications become web applications, who needs a computer anymore? A zero-administration appliance with integrated browser would do just as well... This reminds me we're living in a post-Microsoft computer renaissance, client-server model of computing was used and then abandoned in favor of MS solutions years ago. It is comming back now.
--Coder
As soon as someone (except me, right here, right now) mentions "Web 2.0" you can pretty well write-off the rest of the conversation as marketing crud. That page mentioned "Web 2.0" twenty one times.
I need to have data cached locally - but if I'm going to have a local solution set up anyways I might as well go with that and avoid the hassle.
In less than 20 years the standard PC hard drive will hold 100 terabytes - as much as the whole internet today.
The drive will cost about $100 in today's money. A different type of client will be possible and routine by then.
By the way... 1999 called, they want their ideas back!
Perhaps not.
.NET ... though you'll have to watch your credit card as that software lands in your local cache.
It could be very useful to have an environment (hardware, or a virtual environment on a PC) which replicated an (encrypted) private data store with a central server and did the same (in the other direction) for a public application repository. Documents available everywhere, continue to work if network down, no software installation (it just arrives as required). However, it would require a *standard* environment which delivered a decent, interactive user experience for all application types. So not AJAX. Or Java (with its current set of UIs).
Arguably, of course, this is where Microsoft is heading with
I think it's interesting to note that AJAX and online desktops were presaged by Desktop.com in 1999-2000. I worked there, so I can say with authority that we did have a full web-based operating system going in Netscape 4 and IE 4. The stuff that's done now isn't as complex as the stuff we had, in general, though recently (GTalk through GMail, for example) it's started coming close. (I admit I haven't been following some of the other sites mentioned, so maybe some other folks are further along.)
We ran into a couple of killer problems:
* Browser instability -- we had no control over this. Netscape lasted on average 10-15 minutes and ate tons of memory. IE lasted longer, but also consumed memory until it crashed.
* Slow connections -- we had a good 500K download at first connection (or empty cache), which was *slow* over dailup, which was the norm.
* Apps -- nobody is going to come if the apps aren't there. In the day, even making a notepad clone was difficult because native HTML controls were always on top.
The first two of these problems have been/are being slowly overcome. The third one is still a problem.
But the problem of privacy has never really been foremost in the minds of users. Maybe it will be, but with everyone using web mail, I'm kinda doubtful.
Ian
I don't need a web desktop. I just need a VNC client written in AJAX which can display my home PC anywhere on any browser behind ans SSL proxy/firewall.
Now THAT would be useful.
Try to VNC home through a proxy where you don't have access to any way of creating a tunnel (e.g. a cybercafe)
Georges
Atari rules... ermm... ruled.
The browsing paradigm needs to change for this technology to be of any use, we are too stuck on the static webpage. Why? cause 1. users are used to navigating pages and 2. developers are still designing for 'multiple pages' in a website/portal. I think we need to switch from bottom up design to top down (workflow logic) with more focus on the controller layer.
BTW, as we get more mobile, our attention spans will actually improve and be more focused, since we'll have information we want to review on demand; more time to focus on that information. As for security, the internet as a whole needs to improve it's trust system, not authenication & authorization. Or users just keep their private data private: that is, offline.
Bleah. That would truly be the 7th circle of hell......
While there might be some concerns about privacy, or even confidentiality, given that some people might feel as though they're risking the confidential nature of thier information by putting it on an online word processor, I think that most of these fears will fade. Like email, people will eventually become comfortable with this new way of doing things.
I certainly think the idea of the online word processors is bound to catch on to some degree.
Later, GJC
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep
We see a few "Web 2.0" apps, and we make our comments based upon those. However, that's like looking at Alexander Graham Bell's demonstration of his first telephone and comment that it would never get anywhere because of its technical limitations.
* What if instead of your Web 2.0 application using a remote server, it used your own desktop machine as a server. Would you still need your Internet connection?
* What if businesses ran their own Ajax applications for wordprocessing, spreadsheets, and whatever else they do instead of needing every application loaded on each and every PC?
* What if you could quickly switch from one HTTP server (running from say Google.com) to another HTTP server (running on your desktop). What if the application could store your data remotely and locally? You could use a remote server when you have good service and switch to your local server when you don't have Internet connectivity.
* What if you decide not to lug around your desktop machine, but rather work on a PC laptop? Maybe not even a laptop, but a Linux based PDA?
Do you see where this could be heading?
With "Web 2.0" applications, you could be running an application from your "desktop server", from your company's server, or even from a public server. It doesn't matter! Your application will still work.
With "Web 2.0", your data could be stored locally, remotely, or even both. It is even possible for a remote server to "update" your local instance of your application when you decide to work locally. When you switch to your local desktop server, you still have the same up to date application you had on the Web.
With "Web 2.0", you're not tied down to a particular piece of hardware or even a single platform. You could be using your Windows XP desktop at work, switch to your laptop on the train ride home, switch to your Mac at home, and when you go off on your well deserved ski vacation, switch to your handheld Linux powered PDA. Each and every device would have access to all the applications and data you need. There's no difference between one piece of hardware vs. another.
Corporations are no longer have to preload their desktop machines with the applications their workers need. They're not tied down to a particular platform. No more waiting for that MSCE to show up in order to install that application you need. Heck, if a meteor came flying through the window and smashed your desktop PC, you could get on another one and not miss a lick of work. You'll still have the same desktop and the same applications. The last time my PC died at work, it took me two weeks to get back up and running.
When an application is updated, everyone at your company has the latest copy. You don't have to install it on tens of thousands PCs. Desktop support is much simpler. You don't have to worry whether someone has the same version of your appliction (or even if they have your application).
That's why everyone is so excited by "Web 2.0".
Unfortunately, I don't believe AJAX is going to be the way to go. (Of course, what do I know? I thought Windows 95 would be a flop.) Ajax is too iffy. JavaScript is not the "universal" language we all think it is. Every browser on every hardware platform implements it a bit differently. Its even worse than Sun's "write once, run everywhere" JVM platform. I'm playing around with Ruby on Rails to see if that feels any better.
Internet != the web
100 terabytes is only 17000 DVD ISOs. Piratebay alone has several thousand, add in the other P2P services and different warez channels like FTP and it's obvious that file trading alone has more data. Add in the huge amount of legitimate data - the vast scientific datasets (many of which are web accessible, check out e.g HEASARC or simbad), thousands of "web radio" and video streams, thousands of game demos (which are often hundreds of megabytes), there are probably a couple of terabytes of linux install CDs and DVDs alone (1000 distros * 3 versions * 700 meg per version), saying nothing about all the other free software.
p.s. my PC has 0.6 terabytes. Do I have a copy of the web from 1992 on there? Nope.
I don't think we're the core audience for this product (or the article). The major sites I search for info all live on a toolbar - and a folder of shortcuts on a jump drive takes care of portability. For Joe User, this isn't as easy, since it isn't always intuitive. I think education on how to work with existing tools would be at least as useful as trotting out another portal and calling it the newest version of sliced bread.
The article mentions quite a few corporate-hosted AJAX desktops.
Are there any similar open-source entries in the market for those of us who might want a "usable from anywhere" solution but which is hosted on a machine we control?
I currently use Horde IMP for web-based email, and I'm thinking of possibly installing FCKEditor on my home server box, but I'm wondering if there's an "all in one" solution out there.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
anyone not seeing this trend 12 months ago is blind. The desktop OS will be a thing of the past inside 3 years. All you will need is a browser, doesnt matter which one, and an account with Google. All the major things people do with their computers will be online.
IT is Dead. The industry is Shot Join Others Who Feel Your Pain http://www.internalstrife.com/
The legal line will get blurred very soon. (The content companies will make sure of this.) That will make any server clauses completely void. The only meaningful contract language left will be bandwidth limits and volume of data traffic per billing cycle. And if you think about it, that's all the ISPs really care about anyways.
argumentum ad fallacium: Fallacy of defining a fallacy which allows one to dismiss the argument in question.
I have with Comcast and Knology. It might not be explicity granted but as long as you aren't dominating the bandwith it hasn't been explicitly denied. You can request static IP addresses with either comapny for a marginal fee - I did not, and with Comcast over a 2 year period my IP only changed 4 times! I ran a low-traffic site with a dynamic IP service, no problem.
I used my home computer to host a few personal web sites, pictures of my son (we live far away from the grandparents and they want pictures) and access to documents from work and grad school (via either FTP or remote desktop)
not to mention that imho getting something like Apache to work on Windows is more efford then installing Suse with a webserver for example.
I've used IIS and Apache on Windows. While both have their perks, Apache is dead easy to install on windows. It has a graphical installer and installs as a service in less than 10 clicks. Way easier than installing Suse.
(Not to mention that XP Pro comes with IIS...)
http://www.webwizguide.com/asp/tutorials/installin g_iis_winXP_pro.asp
XP Pro ships with IIS. Unless they are running XP home, they probably have IIS on their CD. Just need to install and patch...
I don't know I'm starting to see some useful applications come from Ajax. Admittedly we only need so many home portals and word processors from ajax but places like Green Village Docs http://www.greenvillagedocs.com/ are taking on Zip Forms and even to a certain degree Adoboe with online document fill out using ajax.
The next thing applies to this more directly. Companies like Microsoft are going to move the data center into the home. Probably Microsoft, will offer a software package for windows, (or maybe just a version of Windows), which is a personal server, (much like many linux distributions). When you set it up you will get to choose what servers you want. There will be the traditional servers: email, webpage, share your files anywhere on the internet (ftp). Then there will be the newer types of servers: "Office on-the-go". (An ajax version of office apps), and "your desktop anywhere", (an ajax desktop server). The setup will be MS easy and the semi-computer-literate families will be able to get it going no problem. MS will probably also offer an administration service where they will remote administer your server for you so you don't ever have to worry about it, (see first paragraph), bringing this home server ability to all people. (And earning MS a ton of service-related money in the process.)
I do security
Any ISP could use NX (from NoMachine [nomachine.com]) to create a "Desktop on the Internet". NX makes X Windows and/or MS Windows fast, so that an ISP could set up servers and serve a remote desktop over the Internet. NX uses ssh so it is secure and the ISP could provide encrypted disk space. All the needed applications would be on the ISP server. The PC would become a thin client. The ISP could provide a way to rsync all the changes back to your PC if a storage medium was available (hard disk, usb flash drive, ...). The only disadvantage of NX is that it does require a client program.
I can run the software I want at home on any given machine, or I can use tools like X or VNC (or ssh) to run/use applications on remote machines. Filesharing means that I can use files regardless of the machine on which they reside.
I think this is convenient, and it makes my machings extremely useful for me. What's wrong with the existing paradigm?
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
No, apps won't catch on either.
First, your browser limits you to horrid controls (from a developers standpoint). Check boxes, radio buttons, buttons, text entry anda drop down.. whoopie. Have you found a good tree view that works on almost all browsers? I haven't..
Second, the responsiveness will NEVER equal that of a desktop. There will always be a noticable delay.
I completely agree. In answering the question of whether AJAX is the wave of the future, its not good enough to only take into account the applications of the present.
I think a well-designed system for running apps remotely would be great, but all attempts so far have had serious problems. AJAX's problems are that its component technologies were designed for completely different purposes (web document display), that it lacks many UI components, that it lacks a programming model on the display side that supports good GUI development, and that it lacks desktop integration (drag-and-drop, menu bars, window closing, etc.).
The previous attempts at this haven't been much better; X11 got everything right on the application side but screwed up on security and compression, Display Postscript and NeWS had serious technical problems and never really pushed remote usage, etc.
The closest to a good web applications delivery language might be XUL or Microsoft's proprietary clone. Or, maybe, just maybe, people will finally clean up the HTML/Javascript mess and fill in the missing bits and pieces; the standards for that are on the drawing board, but whether they get adopted is anybody's guess. Until they are, AJAX applications are going to remain painful to develop and limited in functionality.
This will be a usable technology when the XForms spec has been integrated into browsers.... until then it's just a hack.
Really when XForms is available all you need is XMLRPC... not Ajax at all. ie: XForms + XMLRPC == AJAX killer.
So bring on XForms already....
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
I think changing the wallpaper of the desktop to an ajax-type-web-desktop will be useful. That way no "browser window" will be required.
I personally would hate this too. What if your internet is down. Does that mean you can't use your comptuer at all?
Click Click Bloody Click PANCAKES!
A few years ago, I had a Comcast sales guy show up at my door trying to convince me to switch my (Qwest) DSL to their their cable.
I told him that I ran both mail and web servers from home and that I would only go with the service if this was permitted. At the time there were stories about port blockage, etc..
He made a phone call, I talked to a tech to say what I was doing, and it all went ok with no probs. I ran my home server with them for about 2-3 years without incident until I moved.
I don't know what the current state of things are, that was my experience with a home server.
----- If communism is a system where the government owns business, what do you call a system where business owns govern
I'm pretty sure these things have been around for about 10 years, they were called WEB PORTALS. Except now they AJAXulated all over it and you can drag stuff around with the mouse!
I was unimpressed by those sites, I find http://computadora.de/ interesting, even though it is written in flash and not javascript, it is more of a remote desktop, it has a some useful applications, all of them use the website storage.
It's in spanish, I don't know if there are similar sites in english.
The desktop still outperforms web-based applications in many ways, including providing a seamless user experience (after all, it _is_ the user interface, not confined to a box within the user interface). The desktop is still the most appropriate execution environment for large binary applications (photoshop, for example). A web-based alternative like http://pxn8.com/ is definitely very neat, but it's limited compared to photoshop (for professional use at least).
What's cool about web-apps is that they're beginning to integrate with one another. That's one of the most exciting things about the "web 2.0" generation of applications, and offers potentially more convenience increases than all the ajax realtime-esqueness that everyone's talking about.
But the real end I think we're all moving towards is not just limited integration between sites, but also integration with the desktop. Look at Dashboard on Mac OS X and the fact that Vista is going to support RSS like crazy. Other standards like WebDAV and developer APIs on sites extend the possibilities in this way too. Either way, I think this guarantees that the "web 3.0" generation of apps will be just as different from "web 2.0" as the current gen. are from what some would call 1.0 (that's way too many version numbers, ugh!).
PS. Check out my own "web 2.0" app in my sig -- it's a free file storage service with lots of cool features!
putfwd.com - 1GB Free file storage with a twist
Bandwidth is cheap, but so is processing power. My client systems are now more powerful than many servers. For some *types* of applications, client/server still makes sense. But to suggest that the client should only be used for rendering remote apps is stupid.
I want my data to be local, as well as the software that manipulates it.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Google/ig has been up for quite a while--I feel like it's been my home page forever. Each of the pages I visited from the article seem like simple copies--nothing new.
Why aren't they implementing word, excel, photoshop, All my IM clients, a couple solitare & group card games and a music+video player all with remote storage or the ability to fetch data from another computer when you access it remotely.
THEN you have a "desktop". Until then you just have the same portal you've had since YAHOO went public, but with the ability to drag stuff around.
Could be that most people do not need Word. What they really need is an RTF or HTML editor to be able to print a nice looking document. If wordpad had a spell checker, who would by word?
Google stopped working on your home computer/LAN/ISP, but
Google still worked
- at your local coffee shop (Seattle bias here)
- at your local library
- at your friend's house
- at the local printshop
- even on your cell phone
In other words, your Home LAN/Computer is hardly the single point of access to Google or any other web-based application.
Thin clients remotely accessing large centralized applications?
This sounds familiar- and until connectivity is literally constant and ubiquitous, it will fail again, and again, and again, and again.
The current model of "my access terminal has it's own local storage, and runs apps locally" evolved for a reason.
People want access to their data.
For banking information, it's not my data- it's someone else's data that's relevant to me, so the client->server model works fine here.
But for my documents?
My own creations?
I want access to them, whenever I need it.
Until connectivity is at a point where that need can be fulfilled, this is all just a big load of ajax in your face.
I browse at +5 Flamebait- moderation for all or moderation for none.
Prefer a command line to a GUI desktop? You need Anyterm, a VT100 terminal emulator in "AJAX". Run it on your own server (it's GPL) or join my.anyterm.org. Works through firewalls (only standard ports), can be encrypted with HTTPS.
- last Thursday a chunk of Javascript killed Mozilla in ways that freaked out Windows's window manager, probably with wayyyy too many tabs or too much memory consumption or interrupts or something,
- today I killed Mozilla myself because something, probably Javascript in some ad window, was burning up the entire CPU, an event that's pretty much weekly,
- two weeks ago I killed Mozilla because some Indian online newspaper was using Javascript to pop up windows in ways Mozilla didn't block.
Mozilla lets me turn scripts on/off for browser and for mail/news, but doesn't give me a way to enable Javascript only for pages or domains I trust, and that's a major security hole.AJAX lets you make really cool programming decisions about what work gets done in the browser vs. the web-server application, letting us take advantage of things we learned in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, and kept forgetting each time. Gosling's NeWS window manager did similar things with Postscript, which let you really get good-looking WYSIWYG displays, but it was a security and reliability mess, and Java was a way to re-invent some of the good parts while providing decent security models. Javascript has some good programming capabilities, but it's simply not a security model that's trustable, and any time somebody whines about how *they* know how to write perfectly safe reliable Javascript, they need to get whacked with a clue-by-four, because even if they write good programs, leaving Javascript enabled exposes their users to all the malware writers and the much bigger crowd of incompetentware writers out there.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Sure, if somebody you trust makes a mistake in the AJAX application, it's easy for them to update it, whether it's a security fix or just a functional bug. But if Javascript itself leaves your machine vulnerable, which it does, then you either need to turn it off and ignore all the cool AJAX sites, or leave it on and risk that if you visit malware.example.com you'll get handed something that rips your browser to shreds (or at least something that pops up annoying popups - Javascript seems to be the popular workaround for Mozilla popup blockers.) It's dangerous, and needs to be killed or replaced.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Since when has "the world" ever been concerned about "privacy"....
we will adopt those un-private devices and techniques in swarms!
Call it "Ajax", "Web 2" or event "Web 2 enterprise". it is still markup, some javascript and the ability to script http transfers. The full sets of technology was introduced with IE5, then adopetd by mozilla (and since 1.3 the XmlHttpRequest object is compatible with the one of IE) and now opera and safari 2 (khtml) have also a scriptable http client.
I see the ajax approach as a nice way to get surfers used to the idea that a web application does not have to refresh the whole ui upon any action the user takes. however, html is just not suitable for rich user interfaces, scripting the missing bits will be an effort every implementor has to take.
IMHO the real future for such applications lies in WHATWG, XUL and maybe XAML if this technology will be available with vista. Lets see if this is going to happen.
just my 2 swiss cents.
Looks like idiots have got mod points again...
Someone should come up with a server framework for all of this ajax goodness. Bundle it into a handy newbie-friendly package and voila, live.com killer.