Re: [XForms] Re: Will Internet Explorer support XForms

In a message dated 10/10/2003 13:43:04 GMT Daylight Time, 
sasso@research.ge.com writes:

> But not all enterprises are the same. 

Fair comment. I guess I should have been more specific and specified that 
Microsoft are targetting Windows-using (Windows-only-using) enterprises.

 Pardon me if I am misinterpreting
> what you are saying, but as I mentioned in my last post, you do have
> enterprises where the desktop envionment is heterogeneous, i.e., Windows and
> some flavour of UNIX (or Linux).  Here, I am talking about the user
> community within the enterprise/corporation, not a product that the
> enterprise produces for customers outside the enterprise.
> 
> With InfoPath (as I understand it), you are limited to Windows IE, leaving
> other browsers in the dust.  

That's not correct. InfoPath doesn't render forms you can fill in, in a 
browser at all. At least not in the sense of using IE as IE. InfoPath, as I 
understand it, does use the IE rendering engine behind the scenes but the InfoPath 
client is not, in the sense of the well-known free browser, IE.

You can use IE to link to the URL for an InfoPath form template. But clicking 
that link should cause the InfoPath client to open and the form is filled out 
inside the InfoPath client.

In the aforementioned environment, one cannot
> ignore the browsers that are established corporate standard on the
> non-Windows desktops (Netscape/Mozilla comes to mind).  If I am developing a
> forms-based interface and application that must be used throughout the
> enterprise (i.e. a business req't), then we simply cannot move everyone to a
> single platform, or to a single browser.  Not a solution.  Too simplistic.
> Too costly.  

I guess it depends where you are starting from and how important issues like 
digital signatures are.

For some/many uses I accept that the figures won't add up.

Andrew Watt

> 
> It seems that the effectiveness of open standards is proportional to their
> level of adoption in the industry.  Failure to support a standard by a major
> vendor in the IT industry just throws a monkey-wrench into the endeavour to
> develop a cross-platform application.
> 
> --john