From AppScout: ... "For the third year in a row, leading minds from the major browsers got together at SXSW Interactive to spar with one another over issues like Web standards and openness. As in years past, Mozilla's Brendan Eich, Microsoft's Chris Wilson, Opera's Charles McCathieNevile, and moderator Arun Ranganathan (also from Mozilla) were present, and this year they were joined by Google's Darin Fisher.<br><br>

As always, Apple was absent from the panel. Wilson told me that Apple is active in the standards discussion, but the company's famously closed corporate policy prevents Apple reps from participating in panels like this (almost every laptop I saw in the room was a Mac, so apparently the policy hasn't hurt them much). In any case, Safari's WebKit was represented by Chrome (Fisher), which is also built on WebKit....."<br><br>

AppScout does a great job of collecting some of the best snippets to come out of this panel discussion. Really though, how can anyone have a browser discussion without edge of the Web <i>WebKit</i> device browsers? And then there's this: the discussions today isn't about "browsers". It's about RiA platforms and how browsers are used to launch rich internet applications. Microsoft has XAML-Silverlight. Adobe has AiR-WebKit-SWF. And the Open Web has WebKit-HTML+. That's the battle!

www.appscout.com/...sw_big_browsers_butt_heads.php - Preview

webkit ria silverlight adobe swsw browsers

Building the Dojo Toolbox allowed us to dive into Adobe® AIR™, and to create a blended toolchain of JavaScript, PHP, Python and Rhino (JavaScript on the Java Virtual Machine) for developing an amazing desktop application using open web technologies.

One of the most noticeable things you’ll see when moving from typical browser-based development to AIR is that you only have one browser to worry about. Dojo does a great job of masking browser JavaScript API differences, but there are still enough differences in CSS and other aspects of application development that it is somewhat refreshing to only have one platform to develop again. Also, since AIR includes WebKit, it has one of the fastest JavaScript implementations around and offers numerous useful experimental CSS properties that you can use in the AIR context. Apple has invested a lot in WebKit development, and AIR will naturally inherit those benefits when they next upgrade the included WebKit.

www.sitepen.com/...inside-the-dojo-toolbox - Preview

webkit air apollo adobe dojo ria

At face value, the fight is about Flash vs. Silverlight. Look deeper and the tussle is over not just online video but about cloud computing, rich Internet applications and mobile phones.

gigaom.com/...-vs-adobe-the-rivalry-heats-up - Preview

adobe microsoft silverlight flash

This guide provides a reference for all native ActionScript APIs for the Adobe technology platform runtimes, Adobe
Flash Player and Adobe AIR, as well as the Flex framework APIs.

imjohnny.cn/?p=70 - Preview

flash actionscript flex air adobe ria

Now we have this Silverlight situation, and Adobe has to do something other than run away from Microsoft. It should attack Microsoft with a Linux initiative.

www.marketwatch.com/news/story/story.aspx?guid={AE3FB7A4-EE47-436B-ADF0-0C45AC172F8C} - Preview

adobe flash silverlight linux

www.jamesward.com/wordpress - Preview

ria adobe nickull ward

A must read. This article was slashdotted.

www.techconsumer.com/...-proprietary-web-blame-the-w3c - Preview

HTML5 WHATWG Adobe Microsoft Flash Silverlight

this article takes the RiA discussion to an entirely new level - the battle between Apple, Adobe and Microsoft to control the future user interface (UI). Adobe Flash extends the aging WiMP model, trying to create a "UI Convergence" across many platforms through the Flash RiA. With iPhone, Apple introduces the patented "gestures UI", running off the WebKit RiA. Microsoft presumably is copying the Flash RiA with the XAML rich WPF Silverlight RiA. Unfortunately, counternotions doe snot cover Silverlight. This incredible discussion is limited to Adobe and Apple.

counternotions.com/...flash-iphone - Preview

flash webkit adobe apple iphone ria

WebKit is Apple's Trojan Horse! Excellent introduction to WebKit presented in the context of Adobe and Microsoft RiA's.

counternotions.com/...apple-runtime-answer-2 - Preview

webkit RiA Apple Adobe Microsoft Google Sun

Part two of the Prince McClean Adobe-Flash history. Excellent history involves Adobe SVG, Microsoft VmL-XAML-Silverlight, Apple WebKit, Sun (Java) as they battle for dominance over web applications and the future of the Web itself.

www.appleinsider.com/...creen_project_part_3_of_3.html - Preview

svg ria flash adobe java javascript webkit air

As many know, i've moved all my attention to WebKit and thw webkit "fixed/flow" document model as an alternative to Microsoft's proprietary XAML "fixed/flow". Webkit is the default layout for iPhone, Safari and the Adobe RIA runtime (Flex/Flash/AiR/Acrobat). It's just a short hop from WebKit to VisualForce Pages, the default document model for SalesForce.com developers. The Meta announcement further demonstrates how powerful the WebKit design is. It's will be worthwhile keepign an eye on the Meta JavaScript SDK-Runtime as a nice addition to WebKit. Good stuff!

www.atoker.com/...andard-for-in-game-web-content - Preview

webkit RiA Flex AiR Adobe Apple wikiWORD VisualForce meta

Darryl Taft writes a follow up article covering the comments to his original AJAX-ARAX ruby on rails MS-iron python story

www.eweek.com/...Readers-Welcome-ARAX-and-More - Preview

ajax arax javascript webkit adobe air

Although there are many ways to slice this discussion, it might be useful to compare Adobe RIA and Microsoft Silverlight RIA in terms of web ready, highly interactive documents.

The Adobe RIA story is quite different from that of Silverlight. Both however exploit the shortcomings of browsers; shortcomings that are in large part, i think, due to the disconnect the browser community has had with the W3C. The W3C forked off the HTML-CSS path, putting the bulk of their attention into XML, RDF and the Semantic Web. The web developer community stayed the course, pushing the HTML-CSS envelope with JavaScript and some rather stunning CSS magic.

Adobe seems to have picked up the HTML-CSS-Javascript trail with a Microsoft innovation to take advantage of browser cache, DHTML (Dynamic HTML). DHTML morphs into AJAX, (which so wild as to have difficulty scaling). And AJAX gets tamed by an Adobe-Apple sponsored WebKit.

Most people see WebKit as a browser specific layout engine, and compare it to the IE and Gecko on those terms. I would argue however that WebKit is both a document model and, a document format. For sure it's a framework for very advanced HTML-CSS-DOM-Javascript work.

Because the Adobe AIR run-time is based on WebKit layout, WebKit documents can hit on all cylinders across any browser able to implement the AIR plug-in. Meaning, web developers and web content providers need only target the WebKit document model to attain the interactive access ubiquity all seek. Very cool. Let me also add that the WebKit HTML-CSS-DOM-Javascript model is capable of "fixed/flow" representation. I'll explain the importance of "fixed/flow" un momento, but think about how iPhone renders a web page and you'll understand the "flow" side of this equation.

docs.google.com/View - Preview

javascript html css webkit RIA adobe silverlight

Darryl Taft posts an interesting question concerning running Ruby in a browser, and Microsoft's Silverlight proposal to do that with ARAX. I think he misses the larger context of the rise of RIA, and the wane of AJAX.

In particular, he misses the significance of two important RIA aspects: The Adobe RIA runs on the WebKit layout engine and document model. Microsoft RIA (Silverlight) runs on XAML "fixed/flow".

XAML "fixed/flow" is in effect, the web ready representation of MSOffice-OOXML. And Silverlight the Windows Presentation Foundation layer gone portable.

www.eweek.com/...Move-Over-AJAX-ARAX-is-Here - Preview

silverlight flex air flash webkit adobe wpf browsers

Blog from James Governor covers an exchange with Adobe's David Mendels concerning the transition from the static document centric Web 1.0, to the dynamic application platform we know today as the Web 2.0. David discusses the transition from DHTML to AJAX to RIA. David and his group at Adobe witnessed the transition and coined the phrase RIA - Rich Internet Application, to describe this incredible transition. No mention of WebKit as an important aspect enabling the interactive - dynamic document model behind Adobe RIA.

www.redmonk.com/...-internet-apps-how-we-live-now - Preview

AIR Flex Flash RIA Javascript Ajax Adobe Dave-Mendel

livedocs.adobe.com/...index.html - Preview

air ajax javascript css html adobe webkit

Adobe's Erik Larson introduces Acrobat.com. His blog comments echo his post in response to an article at ComputerWorld: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9091678

In the CW article, Guy Creese of the Burton Group holds the line, defending, as expected, the Microsoft alighnment of MSOffice, Exchange and SharePoint.

blogs.adobe.com/..._to_acrobatcom_work_tog_1.html - Preview

acrobat buzzword adobe air

good interview with Kevin Lynch about the future of the Web. Covers AIR, Flex, Flash, Silverlight and how the Web is moving from universal access and exchange of documents to that of applications. Lynch places Adboe products into a larger context of which problems these inventions solved. The new problem is that of expanding the Web to the desktop through these emerging universal applications.

knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm - Preview

air flex flash silverlight lynch adobe

www.appleinsider.com/...cles_of_flash_part_2_of_3.html - Preview

flash flex RIA Silverlight QuickTime Adobe JavaFX

blog.paranoidferret.com/...x-resources-and-tutorial-sites - Preview

AIR RIA SVG adobe flash flex