On 09.11.2010 15:34, Costello, Roger L. wrote:
> Hi Folks,
>
> This has been an illuminating discussion for me. Thank you.
>
> Here is a recap of what I learned:
>
> 1. The W3C creates complex client-side standards and lobs them over the wall expecting browser vendors to implement them at their own cost, in software products from which no-one earns any revenue.
...directly. Of course there's a monetary reason to develop browsers
(check Mozilla's revenue streams, for instance).
> 2. Some of the standards get implemented, such as XSLT 1.0 and CSS. Many of them don't, such as XSLT 2.0, XForms, and SVG.
SVG is now implemented.
> 3. The browser has become a bottleneck in terms of moving the technology forward. We're all constrained to move forward at the pace of the slowest browser.
That depends a bit on the project, but it's probably true for public web
sites.
> 4. The browser needs to become a much more open platform, in which the browser-maker delivers interoperable extensibility and the rest of the community has the ability to decide what gets offered (and what gets used) on top of the basic platform: an architecture in which both the document markup and the functionality associated with the markup are open and extensible - and in which they are all extensible using standardized interfaces.
I believe that NPAPI deserves serious consideration; keep in mind that
plugins already can expose a scripting API and also manipulate the DOM
of the embedding page.
Best regards, Julian
