Re: Beyond just pretty pictures...

At 09:27 AM 8/5/99 -0700, Andrew Wooldridge wrote:
>I think a crucial aspect of SVG will be to immediately take it beyond 
>"pretty pictures".  Here are some ideas:
>
>1) SVG becomes (along with your own or some other 'standard xml' 
>lang) your "master document".  All the interactivity, all the 
>conversion information, all the revision notes, etc. all in one 
>document (egad Word for the web!).  But what this would mean is you 
>author it in one place, hit "export to HTML" or "export to gif" etc. 
>and it works seamlessly.  It's sort of what PDF might have been 
>except that HTML came along and messed it up for Adobe :)
>
>2) SVG as application chrome - imagine using a Gecko-like svg 
>rendering app which uses vectors for the application chrome and is 
>always editable, styleable, expandable, etc.  Gecko with XUL is 
>almost there, but I dont think Gecko supports SVG yet (at all).
>
>3) SVG as workflow - imagine combining SVG with some sort of workflow 
>language to present workflow diagrams which are "live" in that the 
>embedded rules control some workflow server
>
>4) SVG as forms tool - build dynamic forms and UI widgets in SVG.
>
>I have some questions - but I will post them in a separate email.

Andrew,
These are great ideas. Yes, SVG can be leveraged in all sorts of way. 

One key concept is that SVG provides a full advanced graphics DOM upon with
interactivity and animation hooks which you can build sophisticated custom
web applications.

Another key concept is that SVG is an XML namespace that can be embedded in
other languages and DTDs. Thus, you could define an electronic book format,
for example, which included some document structure elements and used SVG
to render its final form pictures of the pages. The electronic book could
be interactive and dynamic and hyperlinked.

Jon Ferraiolo
SVG editor
Adobe Systems Incorporated

Received on Monday, 9 August 1999 17:45:15 UTC