Oracle AppsLab - Latest Comments in Back to the Desktop

Re: Back to the Desktop

Jake — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 21:07:00 -0000

@joh: Thanks for the suggestion.

Re: Back to the Desktop

joh — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 19:36:27 -0000

here is a good gmail notifier for google apps http://gmailnotifier.net

Re: Back to the Desktop

Jake — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:43:23 -0000

@Tim: That was a good read, and I wholeheartedly agree. That is all. I really have nothing to add.

Re: Back to the Desktop

Tim Hall — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 05:49:25 -0000

Hi.

This is going to ramble and probably be flame-bait so I appologise in advance. :)

First, we felt liberated from client-server by the net, but were lacking functionality.

Next, we tried using Java applets or OCXs to get that client-server feel, but people objected to having to install a specific JRE version and download whole applets, or being limited to a single vendors browser.

Now we use DHTML and AJAX to try and recreate client-server experience, but this has many browser compatibility issues and involves downloading large Javascript libraries, so it's not disimilar to the problems with applets.

The immediate future looks like a rise in client-side apps built on proprietry frameworks, accessing data from web services.

Let's take the case of email. If I have a client side app accessing my gmail account as a web service, this is no different to having a PC IMAP client accessing my server based IMAP email account. All the data is still centralized on my server, not downloaded to my PC like POP, although I can download it if I know I need it offline. So what have we invented here?

What the net has always lacked is a standard framework for interactive applications. We shouldn't be relying on one million and one DHTML or AJAX toolkits. This functionality should either be part of the browser, or part of a standard "web-app" component. That way, people can concentrate on writing useful apps, not worrying about implementation issues caused by the limitations of the platform.

I have a lot of respect for all the people doing amazing things with DHTML and AJAX, but it really is trying to fix the problem with a band aid. At some point in the future we will look back at this and laugh at how ridiculous it all was.

I know it's been said before and it's all a bit idealistic, but the browser in its current form is not the tool for complex interactive applications. :)

Cheers

Tim...

Re: Back to the Desktop

Jake — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 01:23:07 -0000

@Carl: All very valid, but I'm not arguing against the browser in general, just for certain apps in AIR/Prism.

It's moot if we're talking about a computer that isn't my own.

@bex: In this context, it's funny: you emailed me to point me to a post in your blog (to which I subscribe, BTW) about web apps and Web 3.0/4.5.

I guess email is still the LCD for communicating w/people. So, touche.

Re: Back to the Desktop

bex — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 23:51:00 -0000

and what precisely is (gasp) wrong with email??? ;-)

trust me... if I tweeted my every thought, nobody would be happy.

Re: Back to the Desktop

Carl Backstrom — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 22:35:28 -0000

I like what I've seen of Air , even done a little development with Air and APEX. Being able to build applications that run on the desktop using just HTML and JS is awesome. Prism is really nice as well, for the reasons you mentioned.

The main reason I like browser based software though is the browser is arguably the most ubiquitous piece of software around, whether it be FF, IE, Opera, Safari, mobile or desktop, and on whatever OS.

If you sit down at a computer , even if it's not yours or a public computer and it has a webbrowser and it has internet connection you can pretty much use any web based application around.

If you sit down at a computer and need to run an Air , Silverlight , even Flash, based application whoever owns that computer might not be as happy that you installed it or depending on the your privileges you can't / shouldn't be able to install it.

The main issue with browser based software being offline access but that seems to be, and will continue to become less and less of a problem.

Sure I'm slightly biased but that's one of my favorite things about APEX and it's web based development. I can't count the times that I've just jumped on a random computer and demoed , fixed or developed applications.