Re: Widgets - WARP, Widgets Updates and Digital Signatures

Marcos Caceres wrote:
> On 9/16/10 6:10 PM, Nathan wrote:
>> Marcos Caceres wrote:
>>> As above. I thought that was what we (Web Apps WG - Widgets) have been
>>> doing for the last 5 years?
>>
>> Maybe I've missed part of the specifications - are you telling me that I
>> can package up an HTML,CSS,JS based application as per the widgets
>> specification, include a WARP, Digital Signature, set the view-mode to
>> windowed and that this will run as is, in the main browser context of
>> the main browser vendors (Firefox, Safari, Opera, Chrome, IE etc)?
> 
> Ah! ok. I get it now. No, that won't work right now (actually, that's 
> how we run them in our development environment for testing purposes :) 
> ). But that is trivial and no one has really asked for that.

Good to know, and you can consider me as asking for it!

> I'm still a bit lost as to what the use case is?

- standardized application packaging and deployment for the web
- 100% client side application that use the web as a data-tier
- universality
- (user) trust

There are many applications that are currently stuck using a server 
because there is no clear path to deploying 100% client side 
applications, examples include micro-blogging clients, note/task-pads, 
image editors, contact managers, cms/blogging software (think admin), 
well, any application which doesn't natively need a server and where 
client side persistence/caching more than suits, or where the 
data/api(s) being used within the application are exposed via HTTP (that 
covers almost every "web app" I can think of).

Many stick with design paradigms which don't suite (server reliance) and 
others simply swap to building vendor specific browser extensions thus 
loosing universality and all the benefits of standardized APIs and the 
hard work that has gone in to all things webby.

Everything is currently pointing at an exponential increase in 100% 
client side applications, from all angles, we've got client side 
persistence, html5, canvas, ecmascript, gpu acceleration, a vast "web of 
data", cloud storage, positioning the web as the data tier, a plethora 
of standardized and supported APIs + media types - every element. The 
missing bit to tie it all together is for somebody to simply say "here's 
how you wrap it all up and deploy", and that work has been all but done 
under the banner of the widgets specifications.

I am quite sure, in fact completely convinced, that if you provide the 
web community with a way to wrap up client side applications, many, many 
will adopt and embrace. Everybody from RIA developers through to 
extension developers and the vast array of js/html web developers in 
between.

To me at least, it seems that a great deal of work has gone in to making 
it possible for us to create universal applications, and now I can make 
an ECMAScript/DOM/CSS/HTML5 application that works on pretty much every 
device via user agents (soon with gpu support). Every app developer I 
know is looking for this, given the choice between only developing an 
app to work on an iphone, or make an app that works in every browser and 
on iphone/ipad,android etc then it'd be a no brainer in most cases (the 
old realm of flash) - there's nothing to stop them making this leap now, 
other than the one factor "how to wrap it up". Such a simple thing that 
could easily drive a paradigm shift.

Best,

Nathan

Received on Thursday, 16 September 2010 17:39:51 UTC