Adam Bosworth continues his discussion on the “Rich UI” with an endorsement of Central…
what excites me about Central isn’t as much the media as other aspects of it. It has agents which intelligently look in the background for changes and let me know. It can run offline as well as online. It can have context which is so important for many mobile applications. It supports collaboration and direct access of information from the internet. It’s user interface makes use of the ability to ask for and send information to the internet dynamically to enable a much more interactive feel.
…and an appeal…
I think that there is a need for a plain old browser that can interact with the server at the information level and I think there is also a need for Central. We don’t use only one size and type of screwdriver. Why should this world be different?
…which has an answer by another Adam:
By throwing that information at a mod_pubsub Server (via publish), and programming a little JavaScript for the callbacks (via subscribe), you can turn an ordinary Web Browser into Adam’s “plain old browser”.
Adam Bosworth also recommends reading this Kevin Lynch white paper on Rich Internet Applications.
Rich Web Clients+T