Re: XForms in browsers howto?

Robin Berjon wrote:

> 
> Hi,
> 
> I had tested XForms in various manners (including some reasonably 
> convoluted things) for some time a while back and come out of it with a 
> good impression.
> 
> I now have a really complex application that I have been asked to 
> develop, and that must run inside a browser (plugins being considered 
> tolerable, multiple platforms being required). Since the UI needs to be 
> quite convoluted, and for once could do with some more serious 
> client-side validation, I figured I might see if XForms implementations 
> running inside browsers were mature enough to run XForms, and therefore 
> started implementing using XForms. I expected that things would be 
> better than when I last had a chance to take a long look.
> 
> To say that it's been more of a fight than I expect would be an 
> understatement. I hope it's the chaos leading to apotheosis but things 
> seem to have become worse than they were.
> 
> I'll spare you the crashes from multiple Mozilla and Firefox versions on 
> two OSs and the fighting against formsPlayer so it wouldn't display it's 
> own stylesheet and popup (there's probably documentation on that, but I 
> failed to find it though it might have been because I'd run out of 
> patience at that point).
> 
> So, having skipped the rant, is there a) a viable mix of browser version 
> (even nightlies) and plugin and/or XPI combo that will actually roughly 
> work without crashes and annoyances, and b) any chance that within the 
> upcoming say two months that these issues may be sufficiently addressed 
> that one would consider selling an XForms based WebApp without feeling 
> they're setting the customer up for endless trouble?
> 

Hi Robin,

As you know, Mozilla XForms has a ways to go.  We are always on the 
lookout for 'real world' forms that aren't performing well in our 
processor.  It lets us know where we are lacking that we might not 
already know about, helps us prioritize our work and provide us with use 
cases that we hadn't previously anticipated.  After all, getting a real 
scenario working will be more helpful to more people than perhaps some 
of the bugs that we discover ourselves.  If you would like, please send 
me your form.  Or please open bugs in bugzilla.mozilla.org and attach 
testcases.

Thanks,
--Aaron

Received on Monday, 25 April 2005 22:36:15 UTC