On Apr 10, 2005, at 11:28 AM, Lan Barnes wrote:
The universality of web interfaces is a myth.
Yes and no. There are ways to do set up code to do rendering correctly. The problem is that some graphic designer decides that something isn't "pretty" and makes it nonportable. The number of stories from Apple about how the usability folks had to fend off the graphic arts folks about the original Geneva font are legion. For those who don't know, the original Mac Geneva font is this really bold, blocky, (might even by monospaced) font that is just absolutely legible on low-resolution pixel displays, but ugly as sin.
- state is kludged
There is no state. That's the problem. If you need state, you should not be using http. The sooner the developers get that through their heads, the better. Use Java or Flash/Director.
- performance is for-shit
Latency can be worked around, most times.
- simplicity is enforced by lack of tools
Actually the Macromedia stuff seems to be pretty damn good. We just never see it because we are open-source bigots. ;)
- the bulk of developers and all PHBs think 100% of the world uses IE
The developers are the bigger problem than the PHB's. They use Macromedia on Windows rendering into IE and ship. Since the bugs never cost the developer anything, they have no incentive to do any more.
Surprisingly, the PHB's are actually starting to get it. In fact, the most important ones always did. I'll note that my financial services websites all managed to work across a really big spectrum of browsers. Sometimes, they forced me to enable Java (grumble ... mumble), but it was generally the correct solution.
-a -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-lpsg
