Re: [DotGNU]What .NET is this?

[Rhys Weatherley]

Martin Coxall wrote:

> > However, we do need a strong platform underneath
> > that makes writing such alternatives interfaces easier.
> > Right now, a new native binary is needed for every
> > new alternative.  That doesn't scale well.
>
> > Rhys.
>
> Is the W3C's XForms proposal (which I believe is designed to overcome the
> shortcomings of HTML forms as you detailed) the answer we are looking for? I
> haven't examined it in any great detail.

I haven't read very far into this, but it looks like a souped
up version of regular HTML forms.  Applications consist
of three main parts: interface, data, and processing.  The
XForms proposal may solve the first two, but not the third.

If it is just super-forms, then processing would be deferred
to the server, or to embedded JavaScript.  That isn't really
as Turing-complete as I would like on the client.  There's
still the basic underlying assumption that the client is for
UI and the server is for processing, completely ignoring that
systems scale better when you can move the processing
off the server as well.

It's still an interesting proposal in its own right though.
It may be a useful as a UI description language.

Cheers,

Rhys.