The Trend of Simple Solutions on Open Standards

Today I was looking for a Java SSH library for the purpose of automating system administration through Ant (another requirement that came out of the services that I do in my church). I found JSch which is used in Eclipse 3.0 for accessing CVS over SSH2. I looked at the examples and was very happy to find it has everything that I need for my purpose (port forwarding and all). This is just one example of powerful solutions built on top of widely deployed implementations of open standards. Other examples:

• Word processors (or generic applications) built with XML, CSS and JavaScript (vs Microsoft Word or OpenOffice types of applications)
  
• Internet-wide messaging using SMTP (vs JMS)
• Others escape my right now; Will add later

The advantage is you do your work on the shoulders of giants and these giants all developers know and are everywhere your users are.

Rendezvous for the Web

Rendezvous is Apple's zero-configuration networking technology. It enables devices on a local network to discover the services provided by each other. I am just thinking extrapolating it to the scale of the web might be an interesting idea.

RSS, Really Something Special?

Interesting post. This is really JMS for the mass. Recently I evolved the idea of using SMTP (email protocol) for a wide-area implementation of JMS to just using SMTP for notifying updates to RSS feeds. The result is a web of appwikis whose changes are publish on RSS feeds and are forward-propagated to subscribers through SMTP, all widely adopted Internet standards with infrastructure already supporting them.

Microsoft's Vision on Unified Store

Today Jon Udell reports the interesting Q&A session Bill Gates did at the Office conference. Particularly interesting is the point on unified store. My reaction is: Wow! We are just starting and we have already run into Microsoft's turf. On the other hand, our idea has been verified. We may be a little more advanced than theirs, too.

Fortunately, WinFS has been taken off the feature list of Long Horn, which is slated for end of 2006. So WinFS itself may be 3 years away. Also they will always come from a desktop angle. But we plan to move into a hosting model. In any case, at least several alternatives to Microsoft's should be able to survive before consolidations when maturity comes.

XML + CSS: The Future of Word Processor?

Nvu 0.80 is released today. Daniel Glazman, the author, used to work for CPD (Client Product Division) at Netscape. My interest in this area comes from:

1. We need a good word processor for the web. A rich edit control is supported on both IE and Mozilla now. So a Blogger type of WYSIWYG editor is a no brainer. But we also want to blend the web with print, which requires a good page (as in Letter or A4) oriented editor.
2. Our word processor should be standards compliant. Documents produced should be directly viewable in the browser.

So an XML + CSS based editor seems to fit the bill. Nvu is just a perfect solution for that. As we grow our idea, it may very well have an important role to play in our grand scheme of things.