Wabewalker

Engadget: OpenOfficeMouse isn't free, isn't pretty

Eighteen buttons. Eighteen friggin’ buttons! Good God.

That mouse epitomizes one of the more gratuitous mistakes of the open source movement: overly complicated to the point of being completely unusable. The idea “if X is good, then two of X must be great!” is far too prevalent in the geek consciousness. Complicated messes turn normal people off. Sorry, nerds: my mom loves her single-button Mac mouse, and she’s not alone.

This product should have been aborted in the concept stage. Everyone who greenlighted that monstrosity should be banished to a remote island so that horrors like this are never repeated.

Using Cobertura within a NetBeans project is not that difficult, but there are a few subtleties that I often miss. This setup will use Cobertura if the library is part of the test classpath; otherwise, it will silently skip the instrumentation step. For shared development environments, developers that do not wish to instrument will have to create an empty Cobertura library to avoid the dreaded “Missing Reference” problem.

The majority of the heavy lifting is done within build.xml. After NetBeans has set up Ant with its own macros, check to see if the Cobertura library is installed, then load the Cobertura Ant tasks:

<!-- If the Cobertura library has been added to the classpath and it is the right library, set the flag -->
<target name="-check-cobertura-availability" if="libs.Cobertura.classpath">
<available property="cobertura.available"
    classname="net.sourceforge.cobertura.coveragedata.HasBeenInstrumented"
    classpath="${javac.test.classpath}"/>
</target>

<!-- Load in the Cobertura tasks and set runtime properties to reasonable values -->
<target name="-load-cobertura-tasks" if="cobertura.available">
<taskdef classpath="${libs.Cobertura.classpath}" resource="tasks.properties"/>
<property name="test-sys-prop.net.sourceforge.cobertura.datafile" value="${build.dir}/test/cobertura.ser"/>
<property name="build.test.coverage.dir" value="${build.dir}/test/coverage"/>
</target>

<target name="-post-init" depends="-check-cobertura-availability,-load-cobertura-tasks"/>

The following step is annoying, but it helps insure that stale instrumented classes do not shadow fresh compiles:

<!-- Flush all previously instrumented code -->
<target name="-pre-compile">
<delete dir="${build.test.classes.dir}"/>
</target>
<target name="-pre-compile-single">
<delete dir="${build.test.classes.dir}"/>
</target>

This is the most important step. Since we are interested in instrumenting the application classes but do not want to ship instrumented code, we need to dump the instrumented class files somewhere else instead of using Cobertura’s default behavior to modify in situ. Since NetBeans complains if classpath directories are missing at start time (“Missing Reference”), it is best to dump them in a known location. The test build directory is a perfect candidate:

<!-- Instrument the application code -->
<target name="-pre-compile-test" if="cobertura.available">
<delete file="${test-sys-prop.net.sourceforge.cobertura.datafile}"/>
<cobertura-instrument todir="${build.test.classes.dir}"
    datafile="${test-sys-prop.net.sourceforge.cobertura.datafile}">
    <fileset dir="${build.classes.dir}">
	<include name="**/*.class"/>
	<!-- any classes that will not be exercised ("too simple to test") should be listed here -->
    </fileset>
</cobertura-instrument>
</target>

There is still an issue here: by default, NetBeans searches the classpath used to build tests before it searches the test build directory. This means that the default behavior is that the test runner will load the non-instrumented application classes instead of the instrumented ones. Changing the search order for running tests in the project properties solves this problem, but will not affect developers running tests without instrumentation.

Finally, generate a human-readable report (and a test report as well):

<!-- Produce the coverage report -->
<target name="-cobertura-report" if="cobertura.available">
<cobertura-report srcdir="${src.dir}" destdir="${build.test.coverage.dir}"
    datafile="${test-sys-prop.net.sourceforge.cobertura.datafile}"/>
</target>

<!-- Produce the coverage and JUnit test reports -->
<target name="-post-test-run" depends="-cobertura-report">
<junitreport todir="${build.test.results.dir}">
    <fileset dir="${build.test.results.dir}">
	<include name="**/TEST-*.xml"/>
    </fileset>
    <report format="frames" todir="${build.test.results.dir}"/>
</junitreport>
</target>

Happy happy joy joy: now test coverage reports will be generated for those that care, and silently skipped for those who don’t.

location: San Jose, CA

mood: apathetic

I’m annoyed but not surprised about the multiple geekgasms bubbling through the digerati about Google’s pre-pre-announcement of their new operating system, Chrome OS. As I’ve said before, there is nothing a blogger likes more than a tech company catfight, and pitting Microsoft against Google is a classic.

Still, I’m betting on Microsoft to win this in the long run. Not because I think Google don’t have the technical skill; they do, of course. What they lack is the technical vision to pull it off. The whole premise of Chrome OS is that there is enough functionality on the ol’ Interweb to eliminate the need for local applications. Yeah, right: ask Steve Jobs how well “web apps are a sweet solution” worked out for iPhone 1.0.

Hell, I’d be willing to bet that Chrome will never see the light of day outside of the Googleplex. The powers that be will quietly knife the baby rather than release something that will be a mockery of usability. Just using gOS — supposedly based on Google’s own internal distro — is painful: all the glitz of the Macintosh experience without the ease of use. (The idea of “Spray-on Usability” runs rampant throughout it.) In the second half of 2010, a few blogs will post “Whatever happened to Chrome OS?” but that will be it.

Google’s up to something, all right; but radically redefining the idea of an operating system is not it. Maybe they’re trying to kill the netbook market with something that will leave a bad taste in everyone’s mouth.

mood: contemplative

Dan Lyons:

Cook is a great manager, a whiz when it comes to managing supply chains and keeping the trains running on time. He is vital to Apple. Jobs cannot do what he does. But neither can Cook do what Jobs does. The fact is, Apple needs both of them. Forgive me for the analogy I am about to make — but if you’ve seen the latest Star Trek movie, then you might understand how Cook and Jobs work together. Cook is Spock: low-key, cerebral, methodical. He’s the Apollonian counterpart to Kirk, the Dionysian hothead. Kirk is impulsive—but nobody would deny that he, not Spock, should be captain of the ship.

(via Daring Fireball)

No advice for the heir to the throne from me: if anything, my suggestions for products are things not to do. I’m a technophile, a nerd: but unlike my fellow geeks, I am sufficiently self-aware of my detachment from mainstream society to realize that anything I do would appeal to a very narrow subset of the population. (That’s a pretty good razor right there: a nerd realizes he is out-of-touch with reality; a geek doesn’t.)

No, I want to look at the article itself.

Lyons pretty much has said what others were scared to admit. What I found odd about his article was that he danced around his thesis without explicitly stating it: Apple is doomed without Jobs at the helm. Granted, he has always been a Cassandra as far as Apple is concerned, but this time he has a valid point. I can think of only four possible scenarios that can happen after Steve Jobs leaves the CEO seat: two good, one iffy, and one disastrous.

• Apple hires from within. This is the most plausible: Tim Cook is practically CEO right now in everything but name. It would be the least disruptive choice.

  Unfortunately, as Lyons pointed out, Tim Cook is not a visionary. He is, however, the one that the board of directors and institutional stockholders find most comfortable: soft-spoken, hard-working, and rational. That’s the problem with the current suite of CxOs at Apple: they have reached their position by compromise and concession.

  Let’s face it: Jobs wouldn’t even be CEO if he hadn’t founded the company. People like him end up bitter and alone at the bottom of the pile — I speak from experience. When you are that arrogant, the only way you get to the top is to start there.

  Prognosis: stasis or slow decline.

• Apple hires from without. This could happen even if Tim Cook takes the CEO position: one disastrous quarter and the institutional investors start panicking.

  This would kill off Apple’s lead the fastest. There are no executives out there with the kind of artistic vision the position requires (sorry, Ellison — apes do read philosophy, they just don’t understand it). Any outsider taking the position would inevitably try to change the company’s style. Any change to the working environment would lead to a mass exodus of talent.

  Prognosis: a quick trip back to the quagmire of the ’90s.

• Jobs anoints a successor, and it is a creative outsider. This would be the most radical action possible: the one that would cause a panic amongst the prosaic industrial investors, mass defections from the current executive stable, and the one that would be the most likely to keep the company at the forefront of the industry.

  The problem is that there really aren’t any creative outsiders out there. Anyone who is notable and talented is stuck to the surface of Bubble 2.0 and shows no indication of leaving.

  Prognosis: stormy weather ahead, but ultimately a continuation of Apple’s status as a vanguard of consumer technology.

• The CEO position is filled via a “reverse takeover” like what happened with NeXT. This could happen if Apple starts to slip and Cook decides that the only way to regain mindshare is to snap up a hot young company. The problem is that the current collection of hot young companies are led by people with less fiscal sense than a teenager with her father’s stolen credit card at the shopping mall during a fashion blowout. Say what you want, but Jobs has never entered a market without having an idea of how to make a business out of it.

  Of course, this could lead to another “dynamic duo” like the relationship of Jobs and Cook as described by Lyons (really, Dan: Star Trek? Of all the “buddy movies” to pick…). But people are funny creatures: when they get kicked down the corporate totem pole, they start looking for other opportunities. Cook (or someone like him) would have to retain the CEO title but be boss in name only.

  Prognosis: good, but only if the reverse takeover results in an executive cadre that supports its leader fanatically.

What Lyons is trying to say is that Apple needs to continue its success post-Jobs with another Steve Jobs. Best of luck with that. The problem with trying to find another is that the search requires the kind of radical thinking that only Jobs seems to have.

But hey, you have my résumé. Feel free to call.

First thoughts on the Safari 4 Beta:

• Top Sites/Coverflow History. Very nice. This feature is very similar to the one that debuted in OmniWeb a while back. I almost considered paying for OmniWeb for that feature alone, but that they had forked WebKit to maintain otherwise private APIs made me very nervous about long-term support. This’ll probably be a stake in the heart of OmniWeb.

• Tabs in Title Bar. Eh, I can take it or leave it. At first I hated it, because I thought it would really confuse new users. The title bar is the name of the document being viewed or edited, period. But then I realized that the whole concept of tabs blew that metaphor straight out of the water: it introduces multiple documents into a single window. Mac users may laugh at the concept of MDI, but it looks more and more like applications are returning to that model.

  How I would have preferred it: The Mac UI already has a metaphor for manipulating multiple documents at the system level: it is called the Dock. If it were me, I would have changed the tab bar to a dock-like entity, supporting hiding, magnification, and positioning on the window. Either that, or toss the Dock in 10.6 and replace it with a global application tab bar under the systemwide menu. Keep things consistent. (I don’t know why I bother: Apple engineers are bound and determined to pimpify the UI to Vista levels of unusability.)

• WebKit and Nitro. <rant>Somebody please tell me why, after four releases, Safari/WebKit won’t support the CSS2 “quotes” property that has been in the spec since 1998. That’s right, a whole bloody decade ago. I realize corporate pressure means that WebKit extensions that enhance the iPhone and Dashboard come first, but really. Less time dealing with Acid3 corner cases and more time on basic functionality, please?</rant>

  How I would have preferred it: Actually working. (If I could get WebKit to build on my machine, I’d fix it myself. But the Makefile assumes all paths are sans whitespace and I’m loathe to rename my drives.)

Addendum: Called it. OmniWeb is now free (and abandonware).

Jerry is out. Whoo.

Excuse me for not having an orgasm. This is non-news for two reasons: 1) it was expected; and 2) it will change nothing.

Jerry is the Herbert Hoover of Yahoo: he is not responsible for the collapse, but he did little to prevent it. His policies at the end were pretty much “status quo, only ever so much more so.” The company was psychotic from the Semel years, and will pretty much remain so until the rest of the Semelites ablate.

But before Yahoo can recover, it has to show humility. It has to accept that it is not, and has never been, a technology company. Nor is it a media company. It is a distributor, a syndicate, of content from both users and professional publishers. Semel couldn’t accept the fact that he wasn’t an entertainment mogul; Yang couldn’t accept the fact that he wasn’t an engineering genius.

It’s funny how some companies maintain the original personalities of their founders long after the founders have faded into the background. Google was founded by two computer science students based on a data mining algorithm they developed at Stanford; today, Google still thinks in terms of solving problems via engineering. Yahoo was formed by two students who gathered an inexplicable following for their web page of links to content they neither produced nor owned; today, Yahoo is best at managing content and maintaining a community. Microsoft, well… avarice is what best describes them: claw your way to the top via acquisitions and outright theft.

People fear Google, and rightfully so. They see another Microsoft on the horizon: a company that will so dominate the landscape that innovation will all but cease, as it did in the early ’90s. The thing that bothers me is, why put your faith in a company that has shown time and time again that it is not to be trusted? There are far safer ways to keep Google in check than to give Microsoft a ten-year extension to its monopoly.

…is the freetards on Slashdot latched onto Stallman’s dick. Seriously, skinning? Not a killer feature. It’s fun for about three minutes after you download the Lost-themed skin, install it for LOLs, then find it unusable and revert to the default. Always use the Mom test: would your mom be willing to use the feature without assistance from you? I didn’t think so either.

In any case, bundled and free beats out downloadable and free every time. Just ask Netscape.

(As usual, I do not speak for Yahoo!)

Sue Decker:

Yahoo! continually optimizes its algorithmic and sponsored search, and we have, in 2008 alone, developed and launched hundreds of improvements all designed to enhance search quality…

“Hundreds of improvements” is always a bad sign: it implies that: a) the original design was poor; or b) each improvement is a rapid response to a corner case, which in turn weakens the overall structure; or both. Painting over cracks does not eliminate the cracks; it only makes it more surprising when everything collapses.

Ultimately, this decision will be the end of Yahoo! as an independent entity. The Justice Department’s tacit anti-trust policy for the last eight years has been one of establishing lopsided duopolies. Internally, the JD assumed (incorrectly) that Microsoft was the only US business that could keep Google in check. As long as Ballmer remains in charge, Microsoft cannot even keep itself in check.

Selling to Microsoft is not the only option open to Jerry Yang et al. If he were really courageous, he could try to greenmail the Justice Department itself: simply state that if the government does not subsidize Yahoo!, Yahoo! will shut down its search operations and tell its users to go to Google. As I have said countless times before: Yahoo! is not in the business of competing with Google; Yahoo! is in the business of making money. Yang has to remind the Justice Department that it is their job, not his, to keep monopolies under control.

I view Daniel Eran Dilger the same way I view Robert Darnton: an excellent historian when reporting facts, but so obsessed with his thesis that he performs ridiculous analyses. Still, Dilger can turn a phrase quite nicely when expressing common sense that everyone else is conveniently ignoring:

Successful platforms are built on profit incentives for third party developers, not interesting technology demos or promises of developer freedom.

— “Five More iPhone Myths”

(See also Dziuba’s Razor.)

So, you are a small start-up company, or a large corporation, and you want to make sure you have crappy developers? Here’s the secret: don’t enforce any documentation policies. Soon you too can auger into the eternal pit of darkness!

1. Managers weaken documentation policies.
2. Developers skip writing documentation.
3. Lack of good documentation makes new employees upset.
4. New employees flee at first opportunity.
5. Managers panic at attrition rate.
6. Managers try to make developers happy by removing unpleasant chores.
7. Managers weaken documentation policies…

Welcome to mediocrity!

Ted is in rare form:

As a result of this upbringing, programming with the OpenSocial API feels a bit like being bukkaked with tolerance and understanding.

— Ted Dziuba

OK, so grid computing is no longer hip, but cloud computing is? Fine. I’m cool with that because I make no claim to being the overlord of technorati fashion. But as a technical person, I feel the need to point out that there is a fundamental difference between grid computing and cloud computing.

Grid computing

Using a lot of computers in parallel to achieve an easily decomposable task.

Cloud computing

Using a lot of computers that you do not own to achieve a task. Equally, providing the hardware and infrastructure to allow others to perform cloud computing.

Got the difference? Using EC2 to launch your online social network for left-handed goldfish fanciers? Cloud computing. Using GMail because you don’t want to lug your laptop across the country? Cloud computing. Using Hadoop on a private cluster to estimate word probability in documents? Grid computing, no matter how unsexy you think it sounds.

Sorry, nameless SVP: you’re in charge of grid computing at Yahoo even if it does not look good on your pathetic résumé. If you can’t tell the difference, you should be fucking glad you have a job at all because I would have canned your ass long ago.

Personally, I’d rather work with grid computing than cloud computing. I’ve found that a technology only becomes useful after the initial hype has faded. But that’s just me: substance over style.

location: Home

mood: bitter

OK, so the Crispin Porter + Bogusky bomb has been dropped, and we’ve all been exposed to the acting brilliance of Bill Gates enhanced by 300 million dollars. Aside from the obligatory censure from the MacMacs and the laudations from their Windows counterparts, the outright hostility shown to this ad caught me completely by surprise.

The excuses from the Microsoft exponents range from “It’s part of a larger campaign which will make sense once in context” to “It’s Seinfeld! It’s not supposed to be about anything!” Neither of these sound right to me, and the criticism piled on the apologists confirms that the majority of the technorati share my opinion.

I hate to sound immodest (wait, no I don’t) but I know exactly why Microsoft’s commercial failed with the general populace while Apple’s became a part of the cultural landscape almost immediately. All you need to do is listen to the first spoken lines of each:

Justin Long: I’m a Mac.
John Hodgman: And I’m a PC.

Compare that to:

Jerry Seinfeld: Discount shoes, why pay more? Bill Gates!

Did you catch that? It is very subtle, but as with most subtle things, it has a devastating effect on what follows.

In short, Apple is trying to sell a product; Microsoft is trying to sell a person. Apple identifies up front that you are supposed to be thinking about a Macintosh; Microsoft is less than clear what their intent is. That’s a dangerous approach to take, because it is very easy to alienate your target audience. I cannot put it more succinctly than Dave Barry:

Another type of advertising that people detest is the Mystery Commercial, in which there is no earthly way to tell what product is being advertised. These commercials usually consist of many apparently random images flashing rapidly past on the screen, and then, at the end, you see a Nike swoosh, or the IBM logo, or Mr. Whipple.

Nobody likes to be tricked, and the Microsoft commercial does just that. Granted, by context most people would know it is a commercial, but it reeks of forced viral marketing which never works. Sure, there’s an initial flurry of discussion and ineffectual essays (like this one) but the dialogue quickly dies. You cannot make something memetic by fiat, something which Microsoft has tried again and again. Remember “People-Ready”?

The only thing I can hope is that this inevitable marketing failure puts a stake through the heart of the Cluetrain crowd. There is only one true way to tell your customers that you respect them: not through blogs, nor cute videos, nor online web hunts, but through useful quality products. No amount of marketing in the world can hide shoddy craftsmanship forever. And P. T. Barnum agrees with me.

I’ll end this with my favorite rant from Steve Jobs:

But after [achieving a monopoly], the product people aren’t the ones that drive the company forward anymore. It’s the marketing guys or the ones who expand the business into Latin America or whatever. Because what’s the point of focusing on making the product even better when the only company you can take business from is yourself?

So a different group of people start to move up. And who usually ends up running the show? The sales guy. John Akers at IBM is the consummate example. Then one day, the monopoly expires for whatever reason. But by then the best product people have left, or they’re no longer listened to. And so the company goes through this tumultuous time, and it either survives or it doesn’t.

Look at Microsoft — who’s running Microsoft? Right, the sales guy. Case closed.

(For the record: I hate the “I’m a Mac” commercials; but I realize that I’m not the target audience. Apple has already sold me and my ilk a product; they no longer have to please us.)

P.S.: There’s another problem with trying to equate Microsoft with Bill Gates. Bill Gates has decided to devote the remainder of his life to philanthropy. Do you really want to symbolically represent your company with someone who no longer wants to work there?

location: home

mood: amused

I have found a replacement for the late, lamented Fake Steve Jobs:

Linux Hater’s Blog

Excessive swearing, but charming in its anger; and dead-on, especially describing design problems that could have been fixed years ago had egos not been in the way.

G•o•F•i•tis |ˈdʒiˈoʊˈɛfˈaɪd1s| noun The bloating of code resulting from the irresponsible application of design patterns for patterns’ sake.
Example: His use of a Factory object for a basic container class that has no subclasses is resulting in terminal GoFitis.

Here we go again. In the Washington Post article Google Ad Deal Is Under Scrutiny, we get the following gem:

“This is a complicated situation, but one of the key questions is very simple,” said David Balto, an antitrust lawyer who was competition policy director at the Federal Trade Commission during the Clinton administration. “What is Yahoo's incentive to continue to compete?”

I said it once, and I’ll say it again: Yahoo! is not in the business of competing with Google. It is in the business of making money.

If the FTC is so damn eager for a Google competitor, either split the company up — oh, wait; you can’t do that because the DoJ refused to split Microsoft — or create an artificial competitor. Neither alternative solves the real problem: the same network forces that keep Windows on your PC keeps Google as the king of search, and nothing short of a radical paradigm shift will change that. (Yahoo! is trying, I’ll give you that.) Microsoft’s traditional business model — wait, copy, then undersell — just doesn’t work for services. Too bad; don’t expect me to weep for Steve Ballmer.

I’m sure Yahoo! would be happy to accept government subsidies to stay in the search game.

Amazon’s a priori data mining algorithm is always a source of entertainment. Take their latest missive:

Dear Amazon.com Customer,

We've noticed that customers who have purchased or rated "The Andromeda Strain" have also purchased "Philippine Fighting Arts by Julius Melegrito Vol. 1: Single-Stick Tactics and Applications" on DVD. For this reason, you might like to know that "Philippine Fighting Arts by Julius Melegrito Vol. 1: Single-Stick Tactics and Applications" will be released on June 17, 2008. You can pre-order yours by following the link below.

Wanted: a content analyzer and classifier for Amazon.

location: work

mood: pissed off

(Yeah, yeah, I work for Yahoo!; but I am not privy to any business decisions relating to Google. This is in response to the current batch of blatherskite on the web.)

Unless you’ve been in a coma for the last few days, you are aware that Yahoo! is allowing Google to buy ads for a fraction of its search results. And you are probably also aware that the blogosphere hates the idea.

They are morons, and your Uncle Wabe will tell you why.

Somebody at Yahoo! had an epiphany — it might have even been Jerry, but I doubt that — that Google and Yahoo! are not involved in some zero-sum game. That epiphany is right: they aren’t.

Apple had a similar revelation, summed up in a classic Jobsian quote: “We have to let go of the notion that for Apple to win, Microsoft has to lose.” Jobs realized that there was no justifiable business reason to compete for low-value markets in which Microsoft dominated.

The deal with Google is a watershed moment for Yahoo!, and it is no wonder why the pundits don’t like it. The bloggers are nothing more than schoolboys huddled in a circle, chanting “Fight! Fight!” at a pair of unwilling participants, neither of whom wish to batter each other for the entertainment of the mob. In the Valley no successful company is to be unchallenged, the health of the smaller business be damned: otherwise there would be no drama, and no drama means no page views. As the Apple Turns closed up shop after Microsoft and Apple became “frienemies.”

Yahoo! had to get out of the search marketing business, because it was not good at it. Yahoo! is not in the business of being a viable competitor to Google; it is in the business of making a profit. A proper business always focuses on its strengths and quickly excises those business units that constantly underperform. Those who complain that Yahoo! invested billions into Panama and therefore should maintain it are simply subscribing to the Prior Investment Fallacy and should have their blogging licenses revoked. Reading Conned Again, Watson! at least should be mandatory before posting.

If it turns out that Yahoo! can make more money outsourcing its search monetization to Google, than what of it? Loss of confidential information? Yahoo!’s search segment is so small, there are few if any trends that can be extracted from it that cannot be done from Google’s massive data stream. Long-term degradation of the customer base? Only if Yahoo! continues to try to sell keyword-based advertising, and if the test is marginally successful that may not happen. Antitrust concerns? The government cannot force Yahoo! to stay in the search advertising market; if they really have problems, then they should break up Google. Just like they could have broken up Microsoft, but didn’t. If the DoJ blocks this, expect to hear serious screaming.

Coexistence trumps conquest; “Embrace. Extend. Extinguish” succumbs to “Accept. Adapt. Achieve.”

So where does this leave Microsoft? Up the proverbial creek. The problem with Microsoft is that over the last few decades they have amassed a (deserved) reputation for treachery and now they are suffering from it. Any potential partner needs only to read a history book to see what partnering with Microsoft is worth; unfortunately, if Microsoft is serious about competing in the keyword-based advertising space it must have partners. Columnists are fond of Microsoft because its rapaciousness made good press; now that everyone is wary, the headlines are far too tame. Tough time for pundits; don’t expect me to weep.

Silicon Alley Insider is beating the old “Flash on the iPhone” drum again, and I’ve had a couple of private communications about the same. The claim is that Apple is missing out by not supporting (or even allowing) Flash.

Apple users may be missing out on a large chunk of the web, but is it an important chunk? Hardly.

Dan Frommer says, “Web sites aren’t being built with just HTML, CSS, Javascript, and H.264.”

Where has he been, stuck in the ’90s? Outside of YouTube (which is migrating to H.264), there’s nary a drop of Flash on Google or any of the major Web 2.0 properties out there. AJAX rules the roost. Actually, I can’t speak for Facebook; I don’t use it. Yahoo! has a smattering of Flash, but the Y!UI libraries show how a compelling DHTML (HTML, Javascript, and CSS) experience can be made. DHTML is more than adequate for the task; if your designer can’t get the job done without falling back on Flash, get a new designer.

Try surfing with the Flash plug-in disabled; you’ll find the experience much smoother than you would be led to believe by the Adobe marketing department. Flash was created to get around inconsistencies in browsers: fallout from the browser wars of the ’90s. Since Microsoft has recently back-tracked on their attempt to freeze standards at the (broken) IE7 level, expect far more progress in the consistency area.

Flash is good for only two things: games and ads (maybe video, but H.264 is much more efficient and video sharing sites need to squeeze out every drop of bandwidth). Apple is interested in neither for the iPhone, or even the desktop. As far as corporate navigation goes, any company that uses Flash for navigation beyond a worthless splash screen is more than likely only supporting Internet Explorer, so there’s no loss for Apple there.

Flash/AIR and Silverlight are both battling for control of the Rich Experience Web, and as the number of non-Flash, non-Silverlight web sites have shown, the Rich Experience Web does not need either one. Jobs is unlikely to cede control of his user experience to Adobe (which can barely get Flash to run on a full-fledged Macintosh) or to Microsoft (for obvious reasons).

In many ways, Apple is doing a stealth grab for the Rich Experience Web with WebKit: by providing a portable reference platform for HTML+AJAX+CSS+SVG, it can influence W3C standards in ways that benefit its needs. Even Adobe is controlled by Apple in that regard: Adobe uses WebKit as the rendering agent for AIR.

Do you really think a megalomaniac like Steve Jobs is going to leave the implementation of the user experience to another company, especially Microsoft? Do you?

Yeah, neither did I.

Hm, “HTML+AJAX+CSS+SVG.” “HACS.” I like that acronym. Web 2.1, anybody?