At this point web-based "operating systems" have to fight seemingly insurmountable odds to really work well. There are limits in the codebase (choosing JavaScript versus Flash, or a combo of both, results in a few compromises). There are limits within the browser itself (can't save if the window gets closed, or if the connection goes south). But that's not stopping people from trying. Webby's World has a little blurb about
some of these attempts, and mentions a relative newcomer:
XIN. I've been playing with Goowy for a while now and find it amusing and useful, not to mention getting better all the time. It's only a matter of time and maturity before the best of these are either acquired or get swept up in a MySpace-esque social vector. Anyone got a particular favorite in this race of could be's? To me they are like fancy cars- nice to look at, but not practical for driving to work every day.
Tags: ajax, dhtml, eyeos, flash, goowy, javascript, osupdates, wadgetos, web 2.0, web os, Web2.0, WebOs, xin, youos
Facebook Plunges Again
Tumblr 101: Tips And Tricks To Get Started
Comments
2
Subscribe to commentspatrickMay 14th 2006 7:58PM
Why? I just fail to see the usefulness of these. I tooled with goowy for a bit, but it just reminds me of konfabulator/widgets, sitting on my desktop unused most of the time, taking up memory and processor cycles. Feh.
-p-
MikaelMay 15th 2006 6:02AM
The usefulness can be dsicussed, but in the case of XIN we wanted two things.
One, to be able to quickly develop server apps using javascript and DHTML methodology, and two, to be able to open and run multiple apps on the same page dynamically.
That is, to be able to add or remove them from the workflow by a whim.
XIN merges all open apps into one process, so it takes a lot of the strain from the server as well, and it allows all the apps to communicate between eachother, without any risks of conflicts inbetween them.