Re: Choosing a UI Markup Language by Vik David

Did he miss out on something? Yeah. MyXaml.

I also think he is too focused on the whole presentation layer thing and 
doesn't see the benefits of markup being used to drive generic class 
instantiation.

It's an uphill battle, getting people to think outside of the box that 
Microsoft has put over people's heads, it seems.

Marc

Gerald Bauer wrote:

>Hello,
>
>  Vik David - an independent software consultant from
>Virgina - has written up a blog story titled "Choosing
>a UI Markup Language".
>
>  Vik writes:
>
>  Since HTML isn't enough for our next browser-based
>UI application, I checked out the alternatives.
>Several options use XML to describe the UI
>declaratively. This is not a radically new idea, but
>it is one that’s finally gaining momentum because Rich
>Clients Are Making A Comeback and UI programming in
>general is more API specific than necessary. Although
>I've looked at Thinlets before, I wanted to consider
>the competition as well. I grouped them into 4 options
>(ordered by usage of Java):
>
>- Microsoft’s XAML (no Java)
>- Macromedia’s Flex (some Java)
>- Mozilla-backed XUL, pronounced "zool" (optionally
>very Java)
>- other Java technologies (all Java)
>
>Great! I see 4 different, some very vendor-specific,
>ways of doing the same thing. Choose the wrong one
>now, and you’ll be locked in for the next 5 years or
>till the next big thing comes along. Maybe so, but
>it’s a step in the right direction because
>theoretically, you could port your XML-based UI code
>from say XAML to XUL using XSLT – probably less time
>consuming than porting .Net WinForms to Swing.
>Besides, a lot of API-specific UI code is repetitive
>and can be better handled declaratively (like HTML,
>but richer).
>
>It’s hard to do a side-by-side comparison of all 4
>options because some are not fully ready yet.
>Microsoft’s XAML and the accompanying Avalon rendering
>engine won’t be widely available till the release of
>Longhorn and not even Steve Balmer will say when that
>is. If you need to explore XAML right now, try out
>Xamlon and developer releases of Avalon/Longhorn.
>What's troubling is, since XAML is accompanied by “a
>whole new development platformâ€, is it likely to work
>on the huge installed based of existing versions of
>Windows/IE?
>
>In contrast, Macromedia Flex apps work with existing
>browsers and they're pretty cross-platform thanks to
>the Flash player and server-side neutrality (.net or
>J2EE). So Flex offers some java-friendly bait. But
>then why aren’t Java developers biting? Well, Flex was
>announced fairly recently, you have to buy a Flex
>Presentation Server (starting at $12,000) and Java
>developers must learn a non-Java language for UI
>logic: ActionScript. Besides, it’s not like the Java
>camp is lacking in all-Java alternatives (see below).
>
>The third option, XUL, is an XML markup language
>heavily used in the Firefox browser. Unlike XAML and
>Flex, XUL has some hard evidence available in the form
>of Firefox extensions written in XUL. Installing an
>XUL-based extension was a snap – just right-click
>download an .xpi file (XPInstall) and Firefox handles
>the rest. Like Flex, XUL can be used with server-side
>tools like JSP to build dynamic content. Unlike Flex,
>but like XAML, XUL's targeted toward applications that
>also run outside the browser with the help of a
>runtime environment (Gecko Runtime Environment).
>
>Finally, it’s no surprise that the Java platform
>offers the widest set of options for developing your
>UI in XML. Java Republic’s recent poll asking
>developer’s to rank their Java XML UI toolkit had
>user’s listing out several options: Thinlets, Luxor (a
>XUL implementation), SwiXml, and JDNC, among others.
>Compared to XAML and Flex, the benefits of these
>options are: available now, deployable in existing
>environments and low-cost to free. These technologies
>will see a lot of innovation before standardization so
>I'll be checking back on the product vendors of XAML
>and Flex to see how they intend to compete with Java's
>benefits.   
>
>  Source:
>http://vikdavid.typepad.com/fairbiased/2004/08/markup_language.html
>
>  Do you agree with Vik's analysis? Has Vik missed out
>on something? Do you have any advice for Vik? Let us
>know what you think.
>
>  - Gerald
>
>-------------------
>Gerald Bauer
>
>XUL Alliance | http://xul.sourceforge.net  
>United XAML  | http://xaml.sourceforge.net
>
>Interested in hiring Gerald Bauer? Yes, I'm available.
>
>If you know of an opportunity in Toronto or Vancouver,
>please contact me today.
>
>
>
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>  
>



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