Posts in the ‘thoughts’ Category

CommonJS/JSGI: The Emerging JavaScript Application Server Platform

Tuesday, January 19th, 2010
This entry is part 1 of 6 in the series Server-Side JavaScript, Pintura, and Persevere 2.0

CommonJS (formerly known as ServerJS) has become the essential hub around the development of server side JavaScript (SSJS). SSJS for years has suffered from fragmentation, but the CommonJS project has provided the momentum to bring different frameworks together and start building interoperable modules. SSJS is ripe with potential; JavaScript has been soaring in popularity and the ECMAScript 5 specification was recently accepted. JavaScript has proven itself as the language of the web’s client-side (even ActionScript is a derivative of JavaScript). The opportunity to use the same language on both client and server is certainly most realistic and viable with JavaScript as it avoids the need for translation.

CommonJS

CommonJS has focused on developing critical APIs for building reusable modules, particularly for server-side JavaScript environment. The server-side is generally based around database interaction, file I/O, HTTP serving, and the generation of data formats and HTML, whereas the client-side is based around DOM manipulation and the browser object model. There are certainly APIs that can be used on both sides, and JavaScript on the client and server invites the reuse of APIs where possible. The WebWorker, Indexed Database, and XHR APIs are promising to be enormously beneficial on the server side, and with excellent client server consistency. But still the server side requires special attention, and CommonJS is bringing the needed standards and conventions.

(more…)

Tags: , , ,
Posted in CommonJS, JavaScript, Persevere, thoughts | 18 Comments

Convergence of Chrome OS and Android?

Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

Google recently was asked about something we have suspected: Android and Chrome OS may converge. From our perspective, Android and Chrome OS both offer compelling opportunities for building great web apps, but having two distinct operating systems from Google, each with different approaches to development, just adds complexity and confusion to the overall development landscape. Of course, it still bothers us that iPhone apps and Dashboard widgets aren’t interoperable.

Android has the first mover advantage of being deployed today to many devices, but to really get the most out of it, you really should develop using Java, or employ a toolkit like PhoneGap. Chrome OS offers the promise of using web technologies that are popular today, but is not yet production-ready, or optimized for mobile devices like Palm’s webOS.

The long-term expected convergence from Google makes sense. Convergence of Palm’s webOS with Chrome OS makes sense to us as well as they are both pushing towards having a very similar WebKit-based operating system for delivering web applications. Palm already appears to be moving in the direction of converging with Chrome through their adoption of key technologies in webOS such as Google’s V8 JavaScript engine. There’s nothing confirming that this will happen, other than it just making sense.

While there is a lot of short term interest in apps, you can still get significant results from mobile web apps, and the gap between a native app and a web-based app will quickly shrink, as evidenced by apps like Pie Guy. After all, web apps don’t require app store approval!

Posted in Open Source, browsers, thoughts | No Comments

iTunes Store now based on WebKit

Friday, September 11th, 2009

In the continuing blurring of the lines between web and desktop, Apple has moved the iTunes Store in iTunes 9 to use WebKit as its rendering engine. I was actually surprised to learn this was not always the case, especially with Apple adding Safari for Windows a while back.

The rest of iTunes remains a custom desktop user interface, but it would not surprise me to see iTunes 10 be completely rendered using open web techniques. We already see competing products like Songbird using open web technologies for rendering media players, and it could eventually lead to a version of iTunes that lives inside Mobile Me, with songs stored in the Apple cloud.

Given Apple’s recent push on efforts like Time Machine and Mobile Me, it seems like Apple is working hard towards the important goal of making it very easy for users to not lose their data and work, and moving the iTunes franchise to the web would seem to be the next logical step!

Posted in browsers, thoughts | No Comments

JSON Namespacing

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

(or “Why JSON Hyper Schema means JSON doesn’t need XML’s namespacing colon cancer”)

I recently posted a proposal for an addition to JSON Schema, called JSON Hyper Schema, for defining the properties of a JSON structure that represent links or references within data structures. This is intended to provide the same linking capabilities of JSON Referencing, but in a much more flexible manner such that schemas can be used to describe link information in existing data structures without requiring a fixed convention. I wanted to exposit one of the further benefits of using this type of schema: satisfying the goals of namespacing in JSON.

(more…)

Tags: , , ,
Posted in JavaScript, thoughts | 8 Comments

IEeighty6‘ed: The Movement

Friday, August 14th, 2009

Recently, there’s been an increasing emphasis and enterprise-organized uprising focused on eliminating IE6 from the world as quickly as possible. For the unaware, supporting this outdated browser is expensive and limits our creative abilities when it comes to web development.

Mashable has summarized Microsoft’s position that IE6 cannot die until Windows XP dies, even though Microsoft strongly encourages users to upgrade.

We recognize that IE6 was the best browser on the market when released — in 2001. We, also understand that many organizations have invested significantly, buying and building apps on proprietary, non-forward compatible technology such as ActiveX or extensions to IE6. While extensions are not inherently evil, they have a tendency to lock you into a single-vendor solution, which may not be supported in future versions of their product, in this case IE7 and later.

This is one of the reasons that we’re proponents of open source software. We build web applications using free and open source works such as Dojo, which we help adapt and update for new browsers as they are released, to prevent getting stuck with untenable solutions. If you’re looking to unshackle yourself from the confines of an IE6-strapped web application and empower your users to participate in the joys of modern-day web browsing, contact SitePen for a free 30-minute consultation today.

Tags:
Posted in browsers, thoughts | 1 Comment

Platform Optimization Strategies for Ajax Toolkits

Thursday, January 22nd, 2009

With the proliferation of real web browsers on mobile devices (iPhone, Android, Palm Pre, Nokia), an increasing number of browsers (Chrome) or browser-like platforms (AIR, Titanium, Jaxer), portal standards for widgets and gadgets (Caja, AdSafe, work by the OpenAjax Alliance, and much more), are the days numbered for a JavaScript toolkit that uses the same code base across all platforms without a compile step numbered?

(more…)

Tags: , ,
Posted in Dojo, JavaScript, air, ajax, browsers, mobile, thoughts | 5 Comments

Debunking Dojo Toolkit Myths

Monday, October 27th, 2008

The Dojo Toolkit has been around for over four years, and has undergone significant changes, both big and small, in becoming a great JavaScript toolkit. This article debunks myth and outdated assumptions (both fair and false) applied to Dojo over its four plus years of development.

(more…)

Posted in Dojo, JavaScript, Open Source, Performance, ajax, thoughts | 43 Comments

Playfulness in Interaction Design

Wednesday, June 11th, 2008

I recently attended a lecture by Matt Jones on the topic of Playful Design. Matt was talking primarily about engaging users and customers through a process of playful discovery, in which fun and quirky features are designed into products, allowing users to engage in entertaining passive exploration of the product. Playful features could have a purpose or simply be there as a wink to the user. The main idea is to create an atmosphere of play that enhances the intrinsic value of the software or product. This playful attitude can be added as part of error messages, quirky functions, or in-product mini-games.

Although the lecture didn’t really focus in any specific product categories, the overall concept seemed to be aimed at electronic consumer devices, social networks, and the kind of fast & fun web 2.0 applications that are popping up like mushrooms. It got me thinking: If playfulness has value, it stands to reason that play could be incorporated into more serious contexts as well. What about products that are notoriously unplayful?

(more…)

Tags: , , ,
Posted in UI Design, thoughts | 4 Comments

Why Java remains the most popular language on the JVM

Monday, May 5th, 2008

Mark Ramm-Christensen posed some questions about using the JVM as a platform for dynamic languages. Many people do, in fact, use dynamic languages on the JVM (Groovy, Beanshell, Rhino, Jython, JRuby are some big ones… and don’t forget Scala, Nice and other “non-dynamic” languages that target the JVM). But Java the platform has not gotten widespread or serious attention until recently (witness the recent resurgence of Jython, the rise of JRuby and the coming of the Da Vinci Machine).

(more…)

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in JavaScript, thoughts | 4 Comments

Flash, Silverlight and the Open Web

Thursday, April 3rd, 2008

Brad Neuberg, of the Gears team, took a stab at defining the “Open Web”. We at SitePen are very strongly in favor of the Open Web concept, because it’s the Open Web that has gotten us what we have today and will ultimately lead us to the best “web of the future”. I think that Brad does a good job laying out the characteristics that have made the web successful thus far.

The one thing that I disagree with is this part of “Transparency”:

(more…)

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Open Source, browsers, thoughts | 23 Comments