Couldn't most of those concerns be mitigated by running an application
server?
"App server"? IOW, Citrix or Terminal Server? Sure, I guess. If you like
buying hardware. From Citrix's site: " An example: A company that needs
to support 10,000 users on Presentation Server will need to purchase and
maintain 50 dual or quad processor 32-bit servers to service the
population-versus only 32 quad processor 64-bit servers." And if those
are Citrix's numbers you've got to bet the real numbers are even worse.
:)
Is writing cross-browser apps really that much easier than it was 5
years
Easier, yes. Are the problems eliminated? No. Now, IF you're looking at
thick-client then you can also look at dictating browser choice, so the
problems are not that bad. On the other hand, if you are going
browser-based, the follow the first rule of the web, "test, test and
test again". Good news is w/Safari for Windows now you can test all the
major players on your desktop (IE, FF(Gecko), Opera, Safari(WebKit)) of
course you'll need VMWare to test different versions of IE since you
can't have multiple versions installed. Also, use javascript frameworks!
Don't write it yourself. For a really nice one, see: www.prototypejs.org
I disagree. I think right-clicking is still pretty natural for most
people.
Sorry if I wasn't clear. Right-click and drag/drop are ok in the web. I
was referring to the other stuff I've seen in real, deployed, production
thick-client apps (Ctrl-Shift-RightClick) or (Alt-Shift-LeftClick). It's
really cool when it's deployed, you can do a lot from one place, but I
promise no one will remember those options even exist in 6 months.
-Walden
midrange.com
