Tales from the Smart Client

Another day, I'm going to comment on the design of the Avalon styling model, which was largely driven by problems we saw with CSS. Today however, I suggest looking at some of the best evidence that CSS actually is workable: http://www.csszengarden.com...

Devon Strawn points out a very interesting app built with XUL: http://www.secretrobot.com/blog/archives/2004/10/dear_god_where.html His explanation of the significance is good, so I'll leave the comments to him.

http://www.douglasp.com/PermaLink.aspx?guid=5e8aa9f7-a727-4167-8697-f191d3f4b300

Day 2 Doug Purdy from the Indigo team is talking about versioning web services. He mentioned it was his birthday today, and Chris Anderson led the room in a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday." BTW -- Chris has a good signing voice...who knew? About...

Whit Kemmey from the DOD is a very humorous presenter. His problem domain is extreme: describe "Standard Operating Procedures" for controlling nuclear missiles on submarines. On old hardware. Operated by 19-year olds. Underwater. But his sly asides make...

No surprise: Don was excellent. The structure of his talk was "What XML related standards would I want to take with me if I were stranded on a desert island?" His list btw: xml (or lisp), soap, ws-addressing, ws-mex and xsdwsdl. Given that Tim Bray started...

We've got a DOD representative here talking about software for Naval Missile Guidance. Haven't seen the XML connection yet, but to quote him "I've peppered the presentation with pictures of submarines to keep it interesting."

Had not seen http://www.softwarequotes.com until Tim Bray referred to it. My favorite so far is anonymous: "The software isn't finished until all the last user is dead." How true. The DOS-based CAD products I worked on in the 1980s are still being sold...

Chris had a hard act to follow. Tim Bray gave a really good talk, provocative and very personal (not corporate). The room loved him. Chris then got up and gave a talk titled "Developers hate XML". At an XML conference. Just to make it interesting, his...

Tim Bray was worth the price of admission to the conference. He basically had one message: simplicity is goodness. His slides are on his website, but they might seem like a random collection unless you heard how he tied it together. Here's his slides...

Drove through the night from Redmond to Stevenson, Wa. to attend the Applied XML Developer's Conference. I am one of the few at MS who do not carry a laptop with them to every meeting. I find it makes it much easier to be alert and "present" at the meeting...

Brian states it very well Though I would like to know what he has against dancing hippos...