Microsoft Details Vision for Web Future
FROM MIX 07 Microsoft Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie took the stage at the company's MIX 07 conference in Las Vegas Monday morning to discuss Microsoft's vision for the future of the Web, integrating software and services.
Ozzie opened his keynote by highlighting the difficult associated with creating applications for the Web due to the fragmentation across technologies, ranging from the Web browser to set-top box and mobile phone.
"A daunting number of skills are needed to pursue the opportunities before us," Ozzie said, explaining that application development is currently split between the "universal Web" with AJAX and Flash, and "experience first" with phones, PCs and gaming systems.
Microsoft is aiming to unify this by bringing together the best of the Web, the best of the desktop and the best of the device using the service as the hub. Ozzie calls it the "software plus service pattern," which requires a mix of skills - the reasoning behind Microsoft's conference this week.
While Bill Gates heralded the opening of MIX last year, Ray Ozzie's speciality lies in services, which is the reason Microsoft acquired his former company, Groove Networks, two years ago. "The pedulum has swung from pure software and pure service to software and service,” Ozzie said Monday.
Microsoft's movement in this direction is not new, but the company is unveiling a number of new products this week. At the top of the list is the first 1.0 Beta release of Silverlight, Microsoft's new platform for delivering rich Internet applications across browsers and operating systems that challenges Adobe's Flash.
Silverlight 1.0 works with any technology powering Web sites, including non-Micorsoft software such as Apache and PHP, and XHTML and JavaScript on the client side. The beta release includes a Go-Live license, meaning it can be deployed in a production environment now, and a final release is slated for this summer.
Going beyond the current language support included in Silverlight, a 1.1 Alpha release is being offered to developers with full .NET support. While Silverlight 1.0 applications can be programmed with XAML and JavaScript, the integration of the .NET Framework means developers can utilize ASP.NET, Visual Basic, C#, Python and even Ruby.
The next version of Visual Studio .NET, known as "Orcas," will include built-in support for Silverlight as well. "Silverlight changes the game by giving you a new choice for develoing rich Internet applications," said Ozzie. "Silverlight brings .NET to the universal Web."
"In case it’s not clear to you, I’m having a blast," he added.