Re: [Whatwg] Are Web Applications Still a Vague Subject ?

On 25/07/07, whatwg@appxweb.com <whatwg@appxweb.com> wrote:
> 1 Is there an accepted definition of ?document? and ?application??
> (Depending on the answer the remainder of these questions may be
> irrelevant. eg if application really means a ?form?. The last
> paragraph of Section 1.1 of the spec further confuses me, which is not
> difficult to do. )

Well, I'm not sure there are that strong definitions in the face of
hypertext and the web, but I'd say something like this in that
context:
- A document is a single resource, such as can be retrieved by a
single http request, found as a single file on the local file system
etc.
- A (web) application is a system for interaction. A document can
contain several applications, either through placing all logic on the
client or by sending requests to the server through one of several
methods. However, an application can also span several documents,
requesting new documents as the application state needs to be changed.

> 2 When does a document become an application?

The concepts are orthogonal. A document could contain one or several
applications, but at the same time several documents could be part of
a single application.

> 3 Is equal weight and priority given to addressing the requirements of
> documents and applications within the HTML5 specification?

It's hard to say, since one does not exclude the other.

> 4 Is there an accepted design basis for applications i.e. an
> Application Object Model (AOM)?

The phrase "Application Object Model" is unfortunate, since it can be
seen as talking about the application that presents or otherwise
handles the document (i.e the browser, usually). The answer I'd give
is that the DOM is the *Web* Application Object Model, together with
glue such as the non-DOM parts of the browser host environment.
-- 
David "liorean" Andersson

Received on Wednesday, 25 July 2007 17:48:09 UTC