IBM
has donated the intellectual property of a set of technologies to the open
source community in an effort to increase the adoption of Ajax technologies.
Big Blue plans to work with the
Dojo
open source JavaScript toolkit, expanding the application with support for
building multi-language applications.
IBM will also help the application to meet the forthcoming
Dynamic
Web Content Accessibility specification being developed within the
World
Wide Web Consortium.
The
Asynchronous
JavaScript and XML (Ajax) technique allows developers to create interactive
web applications.
A static webpage exchanges data only when a user clicks on a link or button.
Java applications transmit data behind the scenes, making for more responsive
and user-friendly online applications.
Popular examples of Java applications include
Google's
Gmail
and the
Flickr
online photo-sharing application.
Creating Ajax applications is considered an arduous task because of browser
compatibility issues. Developer tools such as Dojo or the
Google
Web Toolkit aim to eliminate human errors by providing automation.
"IBM's contributions are creating the foundation for even broader adoption of
dynamic web interfaces, even for users that have not traditionally benefited
from them," said
Alex
Russell, project lead for the Dojo Toolkit and president of the
Dojo
Foundation.
"It is clear that IBM is serious about improving the lives of its users, and
our community is excited to be a part of that."
Google released
a Google Web
Toolkit beta at the
JavaOne
conference last month.
The tool allows developers to transform Java applications into Ajax code that
can be embedded in a web page, eliminating the need for manual coding and
browser compatibility testing.
The application has been released under the open source Apache 2.0 licence.
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