Re: [e4-dev] E4 for Ajax applications?

[Axel Rauschmayer <axel@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

RAP is an amazing piece of technology, but it complements what I would 
want to do with "pure" Ajax, instead of subsuming it:

- Were I to need both an SWT GUI and a web GUI, I'd use RAP.
- RAP is also the way to go, if you don't want to be bothered by the 
browser environment (which can get ugly, but is getting continually better).
- Whenever I go web-only, I use GWT. Advantages: more responsive GUI, 
multiple sessions per server (I wasn't able to start all the RAP demos 
at the same time, in tabs), offline capabilities, more direct access to 
browser technologies.

The cool thing about E4 is that it can be the perfect platform for both 
RAP and pure Ajax. For the latter, server-side Java is a very useful 
tool to have; E4 would mainly be a server-side technology, leaving the 
browser to GWT or Dojo. There are still some missing pieces in this 
scenario (as mentioned in my previous email), but nothing that can't be 
solved.

Long-term, I think web-only GUIs will become the norm (and thus, E4's 
main focus should be on them). I've written about my long-term vision 
for Eclipse here (=my submission to the E4 feedback contest):
http://2ality.blogspot.com/2009/08/likes-and-dislikes-about-eclipse-e4.html

Am I seeing this correctly? Feel free to point out where I am missing 
something.

Greetings,

Axel

--
Axel Rauschmayer

axel@xxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.pst.ifi.lmu.de/people/staff/rauschmayer/axel-rauschmayer/
http://2ality.blogspot.com/
http://hypergraphs.de/