The Web as an Application Platform: The Saga Continues Antero Taivalsaari Advanced Systems Engineering (ASE) Nokia Research Center Tampere, Finland antero.taivalsaari@nokia.com Tommi Mikkonen Department of Software Systems Tampere University of Technology Tampere, Finland tommi.mikkonen@tut.fi Abstract��� The World Wide Web is the most powerful medium for information sharing and distribution in the history of humankind. In this paper we take a look at the evolution of the Web from a relatively simple document sharing system to a massively popular, general purpose application and content distribution environment. We focus especially on the rapidly increasing use of the Web as a software platform. So far, a number of obstacles have hindered the development and deployment of full-fledged, truly interactive web applications. However, emerging standards such as HTML5 and WebGL are removing the limitations, and transforming the Web into a real application platform. We believe that in the future the use of conventional binary programs will be limited to system software, whereas the vast majority of end user software will be developed using web technologies. Keywords-web programming web-based software development web evolution HTML5 WebGL I. INTRODUCTION The World Wide Web is such an integral part of our lives today that it is very easy to forget that the Web did not even exist twenty five years ago. The original design documents related to the World Wide Web date back to the late 1980s. The first web browser prototype for the NeXT computer was completed by Tim Berners-Lee in December 1990. The first version of the Mosaic web browser was made available publicly in February 1993, and the first commercially successful browser ��� Netscape Navigator ��� was released in late 1994. Widespread commercial use of the Web did not take off until the late 1990s. In about twenty years, the Web has transformed our lives in numerous ways. These days, everyday artifacts and services such as documents, photos, music, videos and newspapers are widely available on the Web. Online banking and stock trading have become commonplace. Various documents that used to be difficult to access, such as municipal zoning documents, government budget documents or tax records, are now readily available on the Web. For most people the web browser has become the most commonly needed ��� and often the only ��� computer program that they use. Various industries such as banking, financial services, electronics retailing and music distribution have undergone dramatic transformations as a consequence. Web- based services such as Facebook and Twitter have altered the meaning of social life. The World Wide Web is even having a profound impact on politics and democracy, shaping the future of nations all over the planet. In this paper we take a look at the history and evolution of the World Wide Web from a relatively simple document sharing system to a massively popular, general purpose application and content distribution environment. We focus especially on the rapidly increasing use of the Web as a software application platform. As summarized in our earlier SEAA���2008 paper [1], so far a number of obstacles have hindered the development and deployment of full-fledged, truly interactive web applications. However, emerging standards such as HTML5 and WebGL are removing those limitations, and transforming the Web into a real software platform. We believe that in the future the use of conventional binary programs will be confined to system software, whereas the vast majority of end user software will be developed using web technologies. The structure of this paper is as follows. In Section II, we provide a historical overview of the evolution of the Web, focusing especially on the transition from web pages towards web applications. Section III presents some of the key enabling technologies that are in the forefront of the emergence of real web applications. In Section IV, we discuss the pieces that are still missing, as well as revisit some of the observations in our previous SEAA paper [1]. Finally, Section V summarizes the paper and outlines ideas for future research. II. EVOLUTION OF THE WEB AS A SOFTWARE PLATFORM Over the years, the World Wide Web has evolved from a simple document sharing system to a massively popular, general purpose application and content distribution environment. This evolution has not taken place overnight. Rather, the history of the Web has undergone a number of evolutionary phases, reflecting the document-oriented ��� as opposed to application-oriented ��� origins of the Web. At the high level, we distinguish three different periods or eras in the evolution of the Web (Fig. 1). In the first era ��� the Web as a document environment ��� the programming capabilities of the Web were very limited, reflecting the origins of the Web as a document sharing and distribution environment. In the second era ��� the Web as an application environment ��� the software development capabilities of the Web started emerging, with different technologies competing vigorously. In the third era that is unfolding currently, we believe that the transition towards the Web as the application environment will fundamentally affect the landscape of the software industry, shifting the balance irrevocably from binary end user software to web-based software. 2011 37th EUROMICRO Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications 978-0-7695-4488-5/11 $26.00 �� 2011 IEEE DOI 10.1109/SEAA.2011.35 170 2011 37th EUROMICRO Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications 978-0-7695-4488-5/11 $26.00 �� 2011 IEEE DOI 10.1109/SEAA.2011.35 170 2011 37th EUROMICRO Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications 978-0-7695-4488-5/11 $26.00 �� 2011 IEEE DOI 10.1109/SEAA.2011.35 170