Daily Archives: April 25, 2011

Microsoft, Office, Tech

Beyond the browser: Microsoft’s ‘C3’ next-gen platform for HTML-based applications

Must a traditional Web browser be the primary way to interact with and navigate a Web application?

Microsoft researchers think the answer is no. They are building another option — ‘C3,’ an extensible platform for HTML-based applications. Along with University of Washington researchers, Microsoft researchers will show off C3 at the WebApps’11 conference this June in Portland, Oreg.

 

 



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(C3 may stand for “cloud computing client,” one of my contacts said.)

Word of the existence of C3 emerged last November when researchers posted a technical paper, entitled “Verified Security for Browser Extensions.” That paper made mention of C3, which researchers called “a new platform for HTML5 experimentation developed entirely in a type-safe, managed language,” specifically C#. (They also subsequently referred to C3 in that paper as “a research Web browser.”)

There’s a bit more information available now about C3 (though the full WebApps’11 paper on it is not yet available). From one of the University of Washington researcher’s description:

“We present C3, an implementation of the HTML/JS/CSS platform designed for web client research and experimentation. C3 introduces novel extension points and generalizes existing ones, creating simpler and more powerful opportunities for customization. In addition, C3’s typesafe, modular architecture lowers the barrier to web and browser research. We discuss and evaluate C3’s design decisions for flexibility, and provide examples for various extensions that we and others have built.”

And from a UW Engineering Web page on the project:

“Nothing inherently confines webapps to a browser’s page- navigation idiom, and browsers can do far more than merely render content.”

The C3 team, which includes on the Microsoft side Wolfram Schute and Herman Venter, have done a lot of work around the concept of extensions, it seems. That leads me to wonder whether C3 is somehow connected to another Microsoft Research project, known as Xax.

“Xax is a browser plugin model that enables developers to leverage existing tools, libraries, and entire programs to deliver feature-rich applications on the web,” according to the Microsoft Research web page about the project. “Xax employs a novel combination of mechanisms that collectively provide security, OS-independence, performance, and support for legacy code.”

Microsoft Researchers are working on other browser- and HTML-app-centric projects, as well, including the ServiceOS/Verve one about which I’ve blogged previously.

Update: If you want to understand Microsoft’s obsession on plug-ins, the just-posted blog entry from the Internet Explorer team on add-ons and IE 9 reliability is worth a read.

Google, Tech

Google insists it will remain open source player

Google insists that Android will remain an open source platform and takes great exception to reports to the contrary.

That’s good news.

“Recently, there’s been a lot of misinformation in the press about Android and Google’s role in supporting the ecosystem. I’m writing in the spirit of transparency and in an attempt to set the record straight,” wrote Andy Rubin, vice president of engineering at Google, in a blog earlier this month.

“Our approach remains unchanged: there are no lock-downs or restrictions against customizing UIs. There are not, and never have been, any efforts to standardize the platform on any single chipset architecture.

Google will release its Android 3.0 code to the open source community when it’s ready.

“We continue to be an open source platform and will continue releasing source code when it is ready. As I write this the Android team is still hard at work to bring all the new Honeycomb features to phones. As soon as this work is completed, we’ll publish the code. This temporary delay does not represent a change in strategy. We remain firmly committed to providing Android as an open source platform across many device types.”

 

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It’s good news that Google reacted so negatively to questions about its open source commitment. If the company had been silent … now that would have been concerning.

I was one of those who raised concerns about Google’s decision — who spread the “misinformation.”

Rubin’s reaction is understandable to some extent. Google has done a lot of good for the open source community. And it employs Andrew Morton and Jeremy Allison, after all.

Nevertheless, it is the job of the press and the public to raise questions when there are apparent deviations to clearly defined principles of open source. That’s the beauty of transparency.

The beauty of open source is that it is open — open for inspection, open for debate and open for criticism.  Was some of the criticism a kneejerk reaction? Maybe.  Maybe not. Whether or not such criticism is “misinformation” has yet to be proven.  But it is worthy of discussion.

Tech

HOW TO: Make Craigslist Better & Prettier With a Browser Extension

Craigslist is one of the most useful and yet one of the ugliest tools on the Internet. And its bare-bones, basic feature set is both a blessing and a curse.

So, how to ease the pain of using Craigslist while keeping its simplicity and utility? Allow us to introduce you to Craigslist Helper.

 

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This handy browser extension (available for Chrome, Firefox and Safari) lets you preview text and thumbnails from your Craigslist search results. You can also bookmark listings and even make your own notes on them.

For example, if you’re househunting, you might use the app to see images of your new pad options without having 30 tabs open; then, you’d be able to prioritize them and even keep track of conversations with potential landlords, all without leaving Craigslist.

Other features include:

* Alerts when new listings that match your search appear
* Multiple searches by geographical area, or even a whole-site search
* Hide ads
* Filter by keyword; for example, choose not to see listings with “freeway”
* Map popups to show locations
* Phone number highlighting

Here’s an example screenshot showing housing listings within 350 miles of San Francisco:

As the extensions’ mysterious developer writes on Quora, “My guess is, [Craigslist doesn’t] innovate simply because they can afford not to — at least until a Facebook to their MySpace comes along.” And until another classifieds startup successfully challenges Craigslist — and believe us, a few of them are trying — apps like Craigslist Helper will have to do.

Will you be trying Craigslist Helper next time you have to do a classifieds search?

MCITP, mcitp certification, MCITP Training, Microsoft

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