Technology for Web Applications

If I was about to start a new software project it would definitely be a web application. A couple of years ago I was building a team creating ERP solution from a scratch. If I had to choose one thing I’d change if I had a chance to start whole thing once again I’d go on-line instead of creating a classical desktop client. And yes, I remember that two years ago web technologies wasn’t so mature they’re now, even though I wouldn’t actually call them “mature” yet. On the other hand now, after two years of following that path it would be a great advantage over competition. Especially when we talk about SME segment of market and multilingual application and that was exactly our target market back then.

When I think about that and I recall all those users I had to deal with when I was support team manager in CDN XL team I believe we’d have to address all major web applications issues. OK, maybe graphical design wouldn’t be so crucial, but speed, contexts, and keyboard-driven steering were on the list. The technology should have been chosen carefully.

A little side note: time when I was an active developer is rather ancient, so I my look at technology is based on what I see developed by others. I don’t say something is definitely impossible with any particular technology, but I believe that there have to be some reasons why (almost) no one makes very good/great applications using the technology. Another little side note: when I look at application quality I consider several factors independently, so I can imagine e.g. great usability combined with poor functionality. Of course overall outcome won’t be very impressive that way.

Coming back to hypothetical technology choice on the end of 2004 I would probably opt for Flash. It loads long, but that’s a single time investment. After that it can work instantly. In terms of speed, when something is efficient in games it will be enough in business applications too. With fully controlled working area, made entirely from your own “controls” contexts shouldn’t be a great problem. I don’t say it would be easy, but I guess there’s no serious technical barrier to achieve that. You could also ignore standard keyboard shortcuts from browser – you wouldn’t have much use of them anyway. A great graphical design wouldn’t be a problem either.

I don’t say that from the technical perspective it would be easy. You don’t see many business applications made with Flash around. The alternative is placed in different AJAX technologies. However, when I look at AJAX applications, they never let me forget I’m using the web. It does mean that despite having all advantages on-line apps provide out of the box (collaboration!) they lost competition in usability category.

I haven’t seen any Flash Application Framework, but I guess we’ll soon see one. The other way is to find universal solution of usability issues in AJAX, which is far easier to use than Flash (basing on number of existing applications). If I had to bet I’d probably go for the former solution, although it can look as a weird idea.