The Web is one of the most important technological as well as social/cultural developments in our life. Its global impact is rooted in its openness and its capability to evolve on a democratic basis.
However, I have concerns. I’m concerned about the significant corporate interests driving towards “unweb”. Not to pick on video, but to use video as an example. Video, the most recent hotspot on the web, largely relies on Adobe’s Flash technology. Not that Flash is not good. On the contrast, it is well designed and implemented as a technology. It enabled the possibility of Internet Video and we should be thankful. However, it is a platform controlled by a single entity (Adobe). We should trust our future in the collective will of the society instead of the goodwill of a benevolent dictator. Another example, the area that I’ve dedicated ten years of my life to, Rich Internet Application, is causing some great concern to me. Adobe is pushing Flex (Adobe’s markup, Adobe’s runtime platform), Microsoft is pushing Sliverlight (Microsoft’s markup and Microsoft’s runtime platform)and Sun is pushing for JavaFX (yet another scripting language invented from scratch – why?). Will Rich Internet become “rich man’s Internet”? Will Rich Internet become the onset of “unweb”?
It looks like so at the moment.
The web consists of millions of people scattered in every corner of this planet. How can we come together to have our voices be heard? How can we, as a community, act together to influence the future of the web?
OpenAjax Alliance has been working on this. After months of work, OpenAjax Runtime Task Force is close to come up a wish list for browser vendors to consider. This is a result of the collective work and contribution from many people within OpenAjax Alliance (in particular, the OpenAjax Runtime Task Force) as well as people who are not member of OpenAjax Alliance. In particular, the people that I need to acknowledge and thank them for their contributions are:
Alex Russell, Douglas Crockford, Joe Walker, Dylan Schiemann, Jack Slocum, Jon Ferraiolo, Kin Blas, Howard weingram, Yehuda Katz, etc.
OpenAjax Runtime Wish List:
| Feature | Priority | Wiki page |
|---|---|---|
| Security features | ||
| Better Security for Cross-site Scripts | (coming later) | Better Security for Cross-site Scripts |
| Stronger Cross-site Request Forgery Protection | (coming later) | Stronger Cross-site Request Forgery Protection |
| Better IFrames Better Sandboxing | (coming later) | Better IFrames Better Sandboxing |
| Client-server communications features | ||
| “The Two HTTP Connection Limit” Issue | (coming later) | The Two HTTP Connection Limit Issue |
| “Persistent Connections” Issue | (coming later) | Persistent Connections Issue |
| HTML5/W3C features | ||
| 2D Drawing/Vector Graphics | (coming later) | 2D Drawing/Vector Graphics |
| Video and Audio | (coming later) | Video and Audio |
| Offline Support | (coming later) | Offline Support |
| Mutation Events | (coming later) | Mutation Events |
| XPath Support | (coming later) | XPath Support |
| Component Model XBL HTC | (coming later) | Component Model XBL HTC |
| Rendering/interaction/event handling features | ||
| Better Support for Rich Text Editing | (coming later) | Rich Text Editing |
| Better APIs about positioning and styling | (coming later) | Better APIs Positioning Styling |
| Better UI Layout Support | (coming later) | Better UI Layout |
| IE 6 and IE 7: “overflow: auto” problem | (coming later) | IE’s overflow:auto problem |
| Event Transparency API | (coming later) | Event Transparency API |
| Event notification for “content overflow” | (coming later) | onOverflow Event |
| Performance features | ||
| “Array” Operation Performance In All Browsers | (coming later) | “Array” Operation Performance |
| HTML DOM Operation Performance In General | (coming later) | DOM Performance |
| Calculating Computed Box Model and Style | (coming later) | Computed Box Model and Style |
| JavaScript features | ||
| IE: Array’s Can’t Be Usefully Sub-classed | (coming later) | IE “Array” Sub-classing |
| Other features | ||
| Hashes for DOM elements and associated API | (coming later) | Client_Element_Hash |
| Ajax toolkit caching | (coming later) | Ajax Toolkit Caching |
| Better testing support | (coming later) | Better Testing Support |
| CSS Object Model | (coming later) | CSS Object Model |
The voting is open now. We hope to get as many people to voice their opinions as possible. Please go and vote at http://www.openajax.org/runtime/wiki/Main_Page.
