December 17th, 2007

My rich Internet application predictions for 2007. How did I do?

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 6:04 am

Categories: AIR, Adobe, Ajax, Apollo, Apple, Curl, Devigner Workflow, Flex, Microsoft, OpenLaszlo, Prism, Rich Internet Applications, Silverlight, WFP/E, WPF, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere, XUL, XULRunner

Tags: Microsoft Silverlight, Verdict, Adobe AIR, Microsoft Windows Vista, Rich Internet Application, Apple Inc., Microsoft Corp., Ryan Stewart

2007 was a pretty good year and it saw me end up with a lot of changes including starting work for Adobe in June. I’ve got some thoughts on what’s in store for 2008 and also a summary of 2007 planned but I think it’s best to first go back and look at my rich Internet application predictions for 2007 to see how I did. I made 10 predictions and I’ll score either a yes or no for each one.

1. Vista is going to raise the bar for experiences across the board.
Well I thought Vista changed a lot of things but unfortunately Vista itself just didn’t do well at all. In order for it to raise the bar I think it has to have sold a lot of copies and gotten people talking about new kinds of user interfaces.

Verdict: No (0 - 1)

2. Adobe’s Apollo is going to be much better than expected.
It’s hard to quantify “much” better but I do think that Apollo (now AIR) has had a successful year. A lot of developers have created applications and over 3 betas we’ve got a strong developer base. I thought it would go without saying that we’d have a 1.0 release by now, but I didn’t make that prediction.

Verdict: Yes (1-1)

3. Microsoft is going to make inroads into the design market.
Tough call. Expression Studio has done well as part of the designer/developer workflow in the .NET stack. Does that count as the design market? Then again is Expression Studio even targeted directly at the design market? Maybe to rephrase the question a year later I’d ask “are designers using Expression Studio” and they are.

Verdict: Yes (ish) (2-1)

4. The Designer/Developer workflow will get some mainstream press.
We saw a TON of attention to the designer/developer workflow with Blend getting a new version and Thermo coming out but the mainstream designers still aren’t talking about it. Maybe this is one to revisit for next year.

Verdict: No (2-2)

5. Apple is going to make a play in Rich Internet Applications
Oh Apple, when are you going to step up and show us your RIA strategy? This year Apple did a lot and there is still a lot of energy and excitement around WebKit. The new CSS features and the video tag have moved WebKit closer to an RIA platform but Apple still hasn’t made the play I thought they would.

Verdict: No (2-3)

6. Competition for technology in the online video space will heat up.
This is probably the one I got the most right. Silverlight was released, Flash and even Move networks all started competing for online video. The price of Flash Media Server dropped, Flash got H.264 support, and the content delivery networks started focusing on HD quality. It was a great year for online video.

Verdict: Yes (3-3)

7. Flex becomes the primary technology for building Rich Internet Applications.
Flex had a great year but is it the primary technology for building RIAs? I think at this stage of the game it’s the most mature but primary is a strong word. One thing that’s happened over this year is that the field of RIAs has really blown up. We’ve got Curl, Ajax getting more advanced and Silverlight/WPF applications in the wild. It’s too tough to call Flex the primary technology.

Verdict: No (3-4)

8. “WPF/E” will have a higher penetration than Apollo.
I’d forgotten I predicted this and it actually gave me pause for thought. Would I make this prediction again now that I work for Adobe? Yup, I would. I have no idea what the actual numbers are but AIR isn’t out yet while Silverlight shipped a 1.0 version. Combine that with the fact that Silverlight has gotten some attention on the Microsoft homepage and lined up some good partners and I think it probably wins the penetration game.

Verdict: Yes (4-4)

9. The Mozilla platform and Apollo will fight for the cutting edge Ajax developers.
Another tough one. AIR has done really well with Ajax developers for the most part and Mozilla has been very true to its browser mission. , the desktop runtime they released this year, speaks to that browser mentality and encourages Ajax developers to keep building for the browser. But in the prediction I used XUL as engine by which Mozilla would try to get the cutting edge developers. It didn’t really materialize that way and I’m not sure the cutting edge Ajax developers have gone to AIR either.

Verdict: No (4-5)

10. OpenLaszlo is going to be a beacon for open source developers looking to build Rich Internet Applications.
Interestingly enough it wasn’t OpenLaszlo that made the big open source splash but Flex. OpenLaszlo had a decent year but it was tough to rally the open source troops when 1) they didn’t seem that interested in RIAs in general and 2) your biggest competitor also goes open source. OpenLaszlo did a lot to move closer to Ajax though, so they’ve broadened their appeal this year.

Verdict: No (4-6)

Ouch! only 4 out of 10 last year. Despite my abysmal record, it really was a good year for RIAs. Stay tuned this week for my yearly roundup. Expect the 2008 predictions next year after everyone gets back from vacation. How do you think I did in 2007?

April 15th, 2007

"WPF/E" becomes Silverlight, struts its video side

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 11:49 pm

Categories: Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, Silverlight, WFP/E, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

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At the NAB conference this morning, Microsoft is giving us a first glimpse at Silverlight, the artist formerly known as "WPF/E". Because the announcement comes from the NAB conference, but also because it's one of Silverlights major strong points, Microsoft is talking a lot about video. I was briefed about Silverlight and the video infrastructure last week and I came away impressed. See the gallery for Silverlight goodness.

When you look at the explosion of Flash video and how it has transformed the web, it was easy to see that Microsoft had to get in. Flash video happened almost by accident, but it really energized Adobe and gave it even more street cred with consumers and media companies alike. The great thing about Flash video is that it just works, and that has been the major part of its success. But it does have some drawbacks. The On2 codec is excellent for the web, but for high definition content like movies, it lacks a bit. Flash also doesn't have native DRM (though that may change this week), so some of the big media companies refused to use it for any of their major properties. It's also a fairly expensive solution to implement streaming. The On2 encoder is expensive, and Flash Media server can also get expensive. The licensing is set up so that as your site becomes more and more popular, the costs rise very quickly. Silverlight finally gives Microsoft an easy web video solution. The Silverlight plugin runs on Mac and Windows, and supports all of the major browsers. It leverages the VC-1 codec which powers Windows Media and also has a fairly robust infrastructure that fits well into Microsoft's platform. For one thing, when you buy IIS, you have all the tools you need to encode and stream Windows Media Files. In addition, using VC-1 gets you a lot of third party tools. As an added bonus, its also supported by HD DVD and Blu-ray. The DRM capabilities of Windows Media are also a fairly well known commodity.

But despite what seems like a technology edge, Silverlight has a long way to go before it can be considered a competitor. The Flash Player is on 98% of machines, which means that media companies can bet that when they deliver content this way, nearly everyone can see it. With Silverlight, Microsoft is starting from scratch, and getting the kind of penetration that Flash has is going to be extremely difficult. They do have some good partnerships lined up though. They're working with MLB.com to provide video for the site. They also lined up Brigthcove, a company founded by Jeremy Allarie , whose company was bought by Macromedia. The fact that Brightcove signed up with Silverlight shows me that it's worth keeping an eye on despite the initial disadvantage.

Silverlight is a wide ranging product, and all aspects of it are going to affect things like penetration and partners. Right now, Microsoft is focusing on the video story, which I think is their best play. Later we'll hear about the developer side of Silverlight and how Microsoft is going to support rich, interactive web applications. That story may not be quite as good, but there is a beta of Silverlight coming at MIX, so we'll see.

April 6th, 2007

Why Rich Internet Applications are important for the browser

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 1:09 am

Categories: Dekoh, Experience, Flash, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, WPF, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere, XUL, XULRunner

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At Ignite Seattle this evening I hung out with Ted Leung for a while and we chatted about Rich Internet Applications (RIAs). Coming from the open source world, he always has a very interesting take on the RIA world and I always learn a ton from him. In this case, he mentioned something off hand that really resonated with me: If we're going to deliver applications in the browser, then we need something better. For him, and for a lot of people, that's where Rich Internet Applications really shine.

There has been a tremendous amount of attention on getting "back to the desktop" with technologies like Apollo and Windows Presentation Foundation that enable some very rich, design-friendly experiences outside the browser. But there is still a very large contingent out there that thinks the browser will be the best way to deliver applications. But if that is the case, then we have to have a model that enables the browser to actually do that. Trying to build real applications using JavaScript that requires a tedious development cycle and a lot of per-browser workarounds just isn't going to cut it. From Ted's point of view, that is what makes the idea of open source Flash so compelling (and important). We get all the richness and robustness of Flash, but in a platform that anyone can contribute to and help grow.

This isn't a post about open source, but the conversation did leave me thinking. Mozilla has started to really expand on what the "browser" is, and they're pushing hard in the direction of making it a viable application platform. Even companies like Dekoh are using Java to help developers create applications inside the browser. But to me, Flash is still light-years ahead. The only perceived knock is that it isn't as open as the other technologies. But we're seeing innovation in the rich, browser based application space. "WPF/E" is the most notable one, and I'm excited to see what Microsoft's vision for the browser based application is at MIX. (Steve Borsch has some interesting thoughts here)

Part of the appeal of Rich Internet Applications is that they are about delivering the next generation of software. They're about supporting the convergence of the web and the desktop and giving developers the freedom to choose the best platform for their needs. In some cases, having access to the desktop will be the requirement. In other cases, browser based applications will be perfect. RIAs span both categories. In the end, it's about the experience, the richness, and the power of building real software. RIAs provide a way to do that that hasn't existed before, and that's why they're so exiting. They change the game in so many ways.

April 4th, 2007

Ray Ozzie on Adobe and software as a service

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 1:01 pm

Categories: Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, WPF, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

Tags: Adobe Systems Inc., Software-as-a-service, Ray Ozzie, Experience, Microsoft Corp., Ryan Stewart

Knowledge@Wharton just published an interview that Kendall Whitehouse did with Ray Ozzie in which he talks about Microsoft, software as a service, and a little bit on Adobe:

In the docs and spreadsheets realm, I believe there are certain uses of spreadsheets in particular, where the sharing model [enabled by] using it up on a service could be really useful. I think that there are other scenarios where you want it on your laptop. As a company, Microsoft views this as an opportunity — to deliver the aggregate productivity value in all places.

Adobe is a great example. Flash is a rich client; it's rich code delivered to the edge. It's not a centralized model; it's a decentralized model. It just happens to be tethered to the service.

If anybody has a software and services model, it's Adobe, because of that rich [Flash Player] applet that they extend the browser with. The more they enhance that, as you can see in their Flex and Apollo plans, the more it becomes this unified software and service vision, which is basically the same as Microsoft's vision.

The article is a great read, and I think it gives an interesting sense of how Microsoft's chief architect sees the entire computing space. What Microsoft can do best is provide their customers a bunch of different solutions. For developers, that's a compelling platform to be writing code for. What still pays the bills is Windows and Office, two things that Ray mentions, but there's also a lot of interesting ideas there. The parts that I cover, Windows Presentation Foundation, "WPF/E", Expression Studio, and how Microsoft connects designers and developers, all tie back to the experience. Microsoft has started pushing that software should be an experience, and this interview with Ray reinforces how important he thinks that is. 

There is also an interesting quote from Ray after being asked how important being cross-platform is to Microsoft:

The guidance that we are giving the development community — and the guidance that we use in-house — is to look at applications through the following lens: When the business model behind that app means that you have to get it everywhere, we call that the "universal web application pattern." When the most important thing is the experience that the user has with that application and you might be willing to trade off the breadth of the web for the richness of that experience, we call that an "experience first pattern."

In our space, we're seeing that play out with things like ASP.NET AJAX, which falls under the category of "universal web application platform" and Windows Presentation Foundation, which obviously falls under the "experience first pattern". But "WPF/E" is still the wildcard. It's a bridge between the two mindsets, but we have yet to see which one it is going to be most closely associated with. Experience is a huge deal to Microsoft, and they see it as a value add, and a reason to adopt their platform. But the web experience is become richer and richer, so if they really do believe experience is important, they should put a lot of support behind "WPF/E". I guess we'll see what happens at MIX.

Image credit to Niall Kennedy.

March 18th, 2007

Microsoft, Adobe, and rich versus reach

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 10:23 pm

Categories: Adobe, Ajax, Apollo, Flash, Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, WPF, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

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With the alpha release of Apollo, all the pieces are on the table and developers can start to experiment with the platforms from Adobe and Microsoft, arguably the two biggest players in the RIA-technology space (as opposed to RIA-solutions themselves). And now that we've seen what everyone has to offer, things are going to get interesting.

There were two posts this weekend that addressed this, and while they're both from Adobe, I think they're worth highlighting, and I think even most Microsoft folks would acknowledge the validity. The first was by Ted Patrick, who talked about rich versus reach. The one thing that struck me about Ted's post was how he portrayed Ajax. A lot of people talk about Ajax being the furthest reaching rich platform, but that isn't really the case. HTML has a very wide reach, but Ajax, when you take in the differences in how browsers treat it, has a lower reach. My main quibble with Ted is his rich numbers. I think WPF is a lot richer than Flash, though you can create some rich experiences with Flash. I also think giving WPF/E one point of richness more than regular HTML is ridiculous. Ted works for Adobe, so keep that in mind as you read, but it's still worth checking out.

The last one is from Mike Chambers, and it does a good job of laying the landscape. He was asked at Apollo Camp if WPF and Apollo compete, and his answer is no, they don't. In a lot of ways he's correct, and that's one of the great things about Apollo. It enables a new kind of software; one that uses web technologies but runs on the desktop. That's very different from the amazing desktop experiences that you can create with WPF and .NET, but both have their place. The desktop has been left for dead in the Web 2.0 world, but it's got a lot of life left and Apollo gives developers with a web skillset the chance to deploy applications on it. I think WPF and Apollo actually compliment each other in many ways because they take on desktop software from very different angles. That's going to be great for developers of all stripes.

The desktop is seeing a resurgence. Between WPF and Apollo all kinds of developers are going to be able to build a diverse set of applications for a platform people like to think of as dead. But at the same time both of these companies are working on their web offerings. "WPF/E" and Flash both take different approaches to rich web applications. We haven't seen fully what WPF/E is going to be about, but hopefully Mix will clear up some of those issues. It's an exciting time to be developing applications regardless of what your rich/reach requirements are. Developers have a lot of choices out there.

March 16th, 2007

We should never settle for web interfaces that are "good enough"

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 5:11 am

Categories: Adobe, Apollo, Flash, Flex, Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, User Interface, WFP/E, WPF, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere, XUL

Tags:

A lot of people picked up a post over on Coding Horror asking if web interfaces were good enough based on the fact that people only use a few of the features that desktop applications provide. It's a valuable read and it generated a lot of good discussion, but I think Jeff Atwood (the author) misses the mark. The seminal quote is when he compares the web version of µTorrent to the desktop version:

After spending about a year interacting with µTorrent exclusively through Remote Desktop, I was pleasantly surprised to discover how good the web UI is. It aggressively exploits the latest Ajax techniques to replicate most of the rich GUI functionality of µTorrent in a browser. But the web UI is still a pale shadow of the full-blown Windows UI. There are small but important details missing throughout, and part of the pleasure of using µTorrent was luxuriating in its intense attention to detail, its wealth of well-designed data readouts. Using the web UI is like drinking watered-down beer. It doesn't satisfy.

But does it matter? Despite my nitpicking, I can do everything I need to do remotely through the web UI.

It's a little disheartening to hear that all we're looking for in our applications is "good enough". I think that's part of the rut that we've been stuck in for too long when it comes to software. We haven't spent enough time on design and experience and we've been left with "good enough". We now finally have some great tools and great technologies - Apollo, Flash, WPF/E, WPF, Flex, Creative Suite, Expression Studio, XULRunner, ect - that fit a variety of needs and make it easier to build great software experiences. Yet we're migrating things over to the web where good interface design and a good experience are difficult if not impossible to create.

As I see it, people like web applications because they're easy. That seems to be the rallying call, and Jeff describes it as the path of least resistance. When I talk about Rich Internet Applications and the need to break free of the browser, I don't want to take the ease of use out of the equation. On the contrary, as Anne notes, there's a hybrid approach here that everyone benefits from. Bringing the ease of the web to the desktop is kind of what RIAs are all about. Why shouldn't we want to keep the robustness and the experience of the desktop?

And that's where Jeff ends, by admitting that there is no reason why we should settle. The thing that kills me is that people don't realize we no longer *need* to settle. The future is here and it's Rich Internet Applications that combine the best of all worlds. We just need to spread the word.

March 14th, 2007

Microsoft Expression Blend release candidate now available

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 3:03 am

Categories: Expression Studio, Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

Tags:

This almost slipped off of my radar as I was checking feeds today, but according to the Expression Blog, Microsoft rolled out the release candidate version of Blend tonight. Blend is an interactive designer for creating XAML-based applications and is part of Microsoft's Expression Studio.

I haven't heard any talk of a release date for Blend, but I have to assume that it's coming at MIX conference, especially with the release candidate tonight. Dan Agonistes who is attending the MVP Summit had some information on WPF, WPF/E and Expression Studio that implied a release date of "spring or early summer". With two of the other Expression products out, I just can't see them not releasing Blend at MIX07, but stranger things have happened. His blog also mentions a "WPF/E" 1.0 release of this summer. I was hoping we would see that at MIX as well, but in his session that didn't seem to be the case.

I don’t see any release notes to know what's changed, but as soon as I find them I'll update the post, but right now I'm off to bed.

March 13th, 2007

The war for Ajax developers

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 1:39 am

Categories: Adobe, Ajax, Apollo, Flash, Flex, Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

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I think there's a war for Ajax developers and I'm not sure the people involved realize it yet. I look at Ajax developers as the pioneers of the web. Like the heroes of the old west they combine a rugged ingenuity with a bit of crude willpower to make a gigantic impact. They've laid the groundwork for how the web works and in the process set a high bar for user experience. Just like the pioneers, I think they're wary of what comes next, so they keep pushing farther west; pushing Ajax to its limits even as the richer web starts to take hold.

So as video and multimedia become integrated more tightly with web applications, what do Ajax developers do? When they want to create animated user interfaces, embrace rich media or add deeper functionality, where do they go? Taken as a whole, Ajax developers have given us some creative, eye-opening solutions to the problems the web has thrown at them. But Ajax can only go so far, and lately it's been hitting its limits. Where do these smart developers go when they want to do things beyond the scope of Ajax? Therein lies the war for Ajax developers and I think there are two main players and some ancillary characters courting the vast, talented pool of Ajax developers.

The generalists
Technologies like OpenLaszlo and the XUL project provide Ajax developers a familiar way to create rich experiences. OpenLaszlo makes it easy for Ajax developers to build an application, then deploy it in the familiar world of DHTML. But OpenLaszlo also allows Ajax developers to deploy a Flash-based application; a good way to get their feet wet in richer technologies. XUL provides Ajax developers with a brand they trust; Mozilla, and a way to use technologies they know to push the boundaries a bit further. Unfortunately XUL adoption has been limited up to this point

Microsoft
The company known for lock-in has actually done a lot to court Ajax developers. It's ASP.NET AJAX product has made a lot of waves in the Ajax community as a great framework for building web applications. But more importantly has been "WPF/E". The first release of WPF/E focuses on video and multimedia. There eventually will be managed code support, but for the time being, the core language of WPF/E is JavaScript. The tools, Blend and Visual Studio, give Ajax developers a much more robust way to develop applications but still stay within their comfort zone. Microsoft's Ajax strategy is one of the more underrated storylines in the RIA world. They've created technologies that shore up some of the weak spots in Ajax (rich media, animation) but still make use of the core parts.

Adobe
Adobe's strategy is a bit different, but maybe more interesting. They've got their Spry framework, which is billed as Ajax for designer types, and it doesn't seem to have gotten traction amongst the more seasoned Ajax developers. But they've provided a Flex-Ajax bridge as well as an Ajax hook for Flex Data Services; both of which make some of Flash's advanced features available to Ajax developers. But the biggie is Apollo which will allow Ajax developers to take their web application knowledge into the blurring world of the web/desktop. Apollo is going to have a big impact on how software is developed and as it does that, it's offering Ajax developers first class citizenship. They can tie into rich media easily because Apollo supports Flash but they can keep their apps mostly Ajax. In many ways, Apollo offers Ajax developers a way to change web applications again, just like they did with Web 2.0 the first time.

Ajax is a good technology, and it's brought us a long way. I'm not belittling the Ajax world when I talk about them as pioneers; they had a profound impact in how end users and businesses alike think about the web and software. But Ajax is quickly hitting the technology wall as developers become more advanced and start looking for better tools and richer platforms. There are ways to do animation and graphics, but they consist mostly of hacks and counter-intuitive development. Rich media is increasingly important to the web and you just can't do it natively with Ajax. So as those talented, creative developers look to the next generation, richness plays an important role. How they choose to do that will shape the web as dramatically as XMLHTTPRequest did the first time around.

March 5th, 2007

Tool for creating "WPF/E" apps on the horizon?

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 4:45 pm

Categories: Devigner Workflow, Expression Studio, Microsoft, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

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I always feel a odd bringing up shortcomings for products that are still very much in development like Apollo or "WPF/E", but one of the complaints I've heard about WPF/E is the lack of a specific tool targeted at the XAML that WPF/E uses. Blend is a great tool for designing full WPF applications, but trying to port those applications gives mixed results. The export to WPF/E XAML hasn't worked well enough for the developers I talk to.

But the guys over at the excellent revolUXions show dropped a bit of a hint about what might be coming for Blend and WPF/E:

We are postponing our WPF/E episode, as we're waiting for certain tools for WPF/E to be released by Microsoft. However, don't be disappointed. We have some major stuff to cover regarding WPF/E that you will not find anywhere else. Trust me. :)

I'm almost afraid to hope, but ideally it would be great for FULL support for WPF/E in Blend. When Eric Zocher showed the "map" of tooling for Ajax, WPF/E, and WPF, there was a big hole for WPF/E between Expression Web and Expression Blend. Blend is the natural tool, so if they're adding special WPF/E extensions or allowing you to create WPF/E specific projects, that would be a big step forward and should help WPF/E adoption when it's released.

February 26th, 2007

A list of Rich Internet Application Technologies for the Digg crowd

Posted by Ryan Stewart @ 12:14 pm

Categories: .NET 3.0, Adobe, Apollo, Expression Studio, Flex, Microsoft, OpenLaszlo, Rich Internet Applications, WFP/E, WPF, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere

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This comment thread made me realize that there is still a lot of confusion about what the different RIA technologies do. Statements like "Flex is Adobe's AJAX offering." or "Flex is like a weak version of WPF/E when it comes down to it." just show people haven't quite grasped where all of these technologies fit. Hopefully this can shed some light.

OpenLaszlo - An open source Rich Internet Application technology. The IDE is Eclipse-based, you write a combination of XML and ECMA Script (called LZX) to build the UI and add functionality. With OpenLaszlo 4, you can deploy OpenLaszlo applications as either Flash apps or DHTML/Ajax apps.

Flex 2 - An application framework that enables developers to easily write apps on the Flash platform. Does not require a server, uses an Eclipse plugin as the IDE and requires Flash Player 9 for the user to run apps. The XML user interface language is called MXML and the scripting language is ActionScript, an ECMA standard. Good solution for building applications entirely in Flash. Flash Player 9 is currently available for Mac, Windows and Linux.

"WPF/E" - Microsoft's cross platform rich internet application runtime, still in beta. Currently the main focus is on web video. The IDE is a combination of Visual Studio and Microsoft Expression studio (Microsoft's design tools). XAML is the XML based user interface and currently JavaScript is the scripting language. There is also talk that .NET code will be added so it can be used as the scripting language. "WPF/E" is only a small subset of the .NET 3.0 framework, so right now it's ideal for adding a bit of rich functionality to Ajax applications but not building entire WPF/E applications. Currently runs on Mac and Windows for all major browsers.

Apollo - Adobe's unreleased cross-platform desktop runtime. Provides APIs in JavaScript and ActionScript that hook into operating system and allow for file I/O, system tray notification, native window manipulation and online/offline synchronization. Still in alpha so not all of the functionality has been decided. Applications can be written in either Ajax or Flex/Flash. Version 1.0 will run on Mac and Windows. Ideal for desktop applications that need to be cross platform.

Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) - Part of the new version of the .NET Framework. The IDE is a combination of Visual Studio (the next version, "Orcas" has integrated support for WPF) and Expression Studio and the UI language is XAML. WPF Supports native 3D acceleration and can be deployed as a browser application called XBAP. Meant for giving developers the ability to build great looking desktop applications. Currently only runs on Windows Vista and Windows XP.