Starting a new software project in (China)

Here comes the Open Web - Embrace it a critical response

This is a critical response to the article written by Jeffrey Hammond titled: “Here comes the Open Web - Embrace it!”

http://www.kmworld.com/Articles/Editorial/Features/Here-comes-the-Open-Web---Embrace-it!-81460.aspx

The open web is a culture that encourages easy access and openness to new technologies. It comprises of dynamic languages, HTML5 and a wider use of the internet for everything ranging, from social graphs to video encoding to payments and order management. The author said that the open web already has a big impact on consumer internet applications which will eventually spread into the corporate world and will be adopted in employee-focused web applications.

Firms that move quickly will have a greater competitive advantage as they can delight and engage their customers better on any devices. The author is of the opinion that all organisations will become a software development company of some sort and gives the following warnings:

• Competition will increase to attract the attention of third-party developers.
• Insurance companies, banks, governments, and retailers will be in a battle to attract developers so that they can develop online services as part of their information systems.
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• Flexibility and ease of adoption will win the day.
• Cloud services market segments like, platform-as-a-service (PaaS) and infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), and are already leading the way in terms of flexibility giving developers more integration choices on how and with whom they integrate. If co-operate service platforms aren’t easy to adopt, developers will tend to stay away from their platforms and the business could suffer.
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• Proprietary Web technologies will slowly decline.
• Application servers specialised mobile middleware and browser plug-ins will disappear as the open web will be non-expensive and will attract developers as they don’t have to engage with a license runtime or purchasing organisation.
• Developer hiring patterns will shift.
• People who grew up on the web, specialising in consumer driven website development, are propelling the open web. These developers expect openness of technology, information and expertise.

The author concludes by encouraging organisations to embrace the open web and give the following recommendations:

• Learn the new platform: Not just technologies like HTML5.

• Determine how the Open Web will speed delivery and cut costs: Open web technologies like Python, Scala and Ruby are already showing compelling productivity gains.

• Decide how your teams need to prepare to successfully adopt Open Web technologies: Monitor and asses the open web technologies as well as your team’s readiness.

• Decide where you should start: All AD&D leaders should steer strategy toward Open Web technologies to better satisfy executive demand for mobile apps

• Develop new services and channels: Open Web APIs allows the next generation of Interoperability between organisations. Organisations should encourage their business partners to use the open web allowing for more productive firm services.

I do agree with some of the things that Mr. Jeffrey Hammond highlighted in his article. Sharing of content regardless of Data format and Platform is currently lacking on the web and there are a lot of benefits to be released if everyone adopted the open web. I also agree with the author that using technologies like HTML5 etc., will help get us there. But it is more than technologies, it is the standard that the technologies represent and organisations are already struggling to adopt not only HTML5, never mind the technologies that enable HTML5. To have a standard API that is used across organisations may be an impossible task as organisations see different benefits and advantages in using different technologies.

http://try.powermapper.com/Stats/HtmlVersions

Lastly I don’t think all organisations will become some sort of a software development company in the future. Organisation should look to the resources based view of the firm to understand business strategy and to provide direction to strategy formulation before adopting the open web (Andreu and Ciborra, 1996).

References

Andreu, R., and Ciborra, C. (1996). Organisational learning and core capabilities development: the role of IT. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 5(2), 111-127.

The future of app development a critical response

In the article by Richard Firth, CEO of MIP Holdings, titled “The future of app development”, Mr Firth argued that HTML5 is the future of application and website development.

http://pressoffice.mg.co.za/mip/PressRelease.php?StoryID=234343

He goes on and makes reference to some popular organisations like Internet radio, Sports Illustrated and Pandora Media who used the new graphical rendering capabilities of HTML5 to enhance the user experience. Also, that big Organisations like Apple, Mozilla Foundation, Google and Microsoft,  all support the new HTML5 standard. Mr Firth also highlighted that HTML5 is better than application developments that are platform dependant.

The article then sifted its direction to some concerns about the fashion trend of HTML5 and quoted a report that stated that HTML5 is still 10 years away from being a stable basis for Organisations. It emphasises that HTML5 has to be accepted as a standard for Information Systems industry not to fail itself.

The article concludes by looking at the overall support that HTML5 is getting from the Organisations that adopt it to the organisations that support it, to the programmers that built it.

I agree fully with what Mr Firth said. From the advantages of HTML5 like the graphical capabilities and being platform independent, to the unified support it is getting from the community, HTML5 is a powerful standard. Will it take 10 years to be a stable basis for Organisation adoption? I have to disagree, as can be seen in the graph by Powermapper which shows that in 2013 40% of websites are using the HTML5 standard. That is already a 5% increase since the publication of this article on the 12 October 2012.

Will Information systems ever fail itself? In my academia, scholars can’t even agree with what we call our profession i.e. is it Information Technology or Information Systems (Checkland and Holwell, 1997). I think a standard is lacking throughout the information systems/information technology community. Information systems/Information technology needs more international standards like HTML5 and one international standard Organisation that makes decisions about this standard,  like the Cochrane Collaboration (http://www.cochrane.org) does for medicine.

References

 

Checkland, P., and Holwell, S. (1997). Information, systems and information systems: making sense of the field.

 

Powermapper. HTML Version Statistics. http://try.powermapper.com/Stats/HtmlVersions. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

Questions and answers by the Head of Communications for W3C

I emailed the World Wide Web Consortium (team-liaisons@w3.org) to see what they think about my concerns regarding HTML5. I received a response from a Mr. Ian Jacobs who is the Head of Communications for W3C. What follows are the questions I asked and the responses from Mr. Jacobs.


Q. Why is HTML5 adoption so slow?

A. The Web Platform is a large set of technologies, and that set is always expanding. Some of the technologies are more mature than others (e.g., HTML5 video is now  widely supported). The Web is always growing, but the industry is very keen on HTML5 these days.

* Gartner listed Mobile Apps and Applications as their number 2 trend for 2014, including HTML5 adoption in the enterprise. http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2603623
* 52% of the developer population uses HTML5 technologies to develop mobile apps
http://www.visionmobile.com/product/developer-economics-q3-2013-state-of-the-developer-nation/
* In a Kendo UI survey 70% of the developers surveyed answered “adopt HTML5,” and 14% planned one native implementation per target platform plus one “catch-all” HTML app for all other platforms. http://www.w3.org/blog/2013/02/interview-todd-anglin/

Q. Which types of Organisations are adopting HTML5? Only Organisations that will benefit from mobile strategies?

A. Organisations  like:

Digital Publishing
Automotive
Television and Entertainment
Games
Retail
and many others.

Q.  How does academia contribute to the development of standards like HTML5? Are there questions that you think requires scientific inquiry around HTML5?

A. The W3C is a forum where many different stakeholders, including academia, that contribute to Web technology. There are some areas where academia contribute more than others (e.g., around semantic web technology).


Q. Because academia has the notion of IT resembling a fashion industry i.e organisations only adopt IT technologies because it is the “hottest thing” currently available, do you think HTML5 is a fashion trend?

A. Fashion trend? If you mean "The industry is very interested in it" then yes. HTML5 popularity is growing. I think that is because it solves real problems.

Q. User adoption refers to individuals that will start or adopt the habit of using the website, i.e. for online commerce and self-service technologies over the internet. The technology acceptance model (TAM) looks at perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of systems to predict user adoption. Do you think that HTML5 enables user adoption more than other technologies? If yes, how do you think HTML5 can be used in a study with the Technology acceptance model (TAM)? Also, do you think if developers use the HTML5 standard to develop web pages, that the standard will increase and individuals perceive ease of use of the website by default?

A. There is a difference between the underlying technology and the quality of a site that uses that technology. But HTML5 and other technologies of the Open Web Platform (CSS, WebRTC, SVG) are becoming more powerful and allowing designers and developers to create better experiences on a broader range of devices. I don't think there's a notion of "default." There is only the developer skill in using available technology well.


After my interview with Mr. Jacobs my views around HTML5 hasn’t changed, except maybe that HTML5 adoption is slow. I think there is a strong requirement for the web to be platform independent and Organisations  are adopting it quickly because HTML5 meets this need.

It should be noted that the opinions expressed in this blog entry does not necessarily express the opinions of the W3C.

The impact of HTML5 on Organisations:

Social tool considerations:

Before organisations adopt a new social tool,  one should check if the website is developed in the new HTML5 standard. Maine (2011) Percentage of web sites using HTML5 still only accounts for 34% of the websites on the web. This means that the social tool an organisation adopts has a high chance that it won’t have mobile support.

  Maine (2011) Percentage of web sites using HTML5

Mobile device differences are narrowed with HTML5. HTML5 is designed to allow any web browser to run complete multimedia content like video, with no 3^rd party add-ons. Its new standard will give browsers a computing platform that is universal in nature and  users could do everything with their mobile from accessing social networks, editing documents, watching movies, listening to music or playing  games. HTML5 can be seen as the biggest evolution in Web standards, allowing consumers to truly access any content remotely and independent of devices or locations (Korkmaz and Park, 2011).

Semantic Web and Big Data together

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is leading the Semantic Web collaborative movement by introducing the HTML5 standard. Common data formats are promoted in this new standard of the Web. This builds on the Resource Description Framework (RDF) of the W3C. By encouraging semantic content through the HTML5 standard, current semi-structured and unstructured web documents will be fused and  converted into a “web of data”.

Attributes, attribute values and Elements have certain meanings to them defined by the HTML5 standard. These Tag definitions allow search engines or web browsers to use and present documents in ways the author might not have considered.

According to the W3C, "The Semantic Web provides a common framework that allows data to be shared and reused across applications, enterprises and community boundaries." (World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). W3C Semantic Web Activity)

WEB 3.0

I recently attended a lecture on Web 3.0 by Mr. Lusapho Njenge.  In this lecture he highlighted what Web 3.0 is (Njenge, 2013):

—  The capability of obtaining contextual information from a web search.

—  The ability to obtain information drawn from a variety of previously incompatible or walled applications or sources.

—  The engagement of all types of devices and machines in the data creation, data usage and communication process that informs our daily lives, our work, our businesses.

HTML5 addresses these requirements of Web 3.0. With its semantic mark-up, which will provide a meaningful webpage structure, ambiguity is eliminated.  These structural enhancements are core to the idea of Web 3.0 visioned by Tim Berners-Lee. This new semantic mark-up will allow computers and people to generate knowledge by rapidly connecting datasets that includes these marked data structures in webpages. Incompatible sources are now standardised through HTML5, giving meaning to the web, ultimately allowing search engines like Google to be more specific with search results (Na and DeRocher, 2011).

Advertising

In December 2011, research firm Strategy Analytics, forecast that sales of HTML5 compatible phones,  will top 1 billion in 2013 (Internet & Media - CNET News, HTML5-enabled phones to hit 1 billion in sales in 2013).

Video advertising can happen more often with HTML5, for example, an internet user browsing a  web page with a mobile device; one can monitor the users shopping activity and deliver real time video adverts on products that the user found interesting.

Development

Duplicated effort in building cross-platform applications can be avoided by using HTML5. Padley (2011) showed how publishers can improve time to market, deliver more future-proof applications and reduce development costs.

References

Internet & Media - CNET News, HTML5-enabled phones to hit 1 billion in sales in 2013. http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57339156-93/html5-enabled-phones-to-hit-1-billion-in-sales-in-2013/. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

Njenge, L, (2013). Web 3.0 Trends. http://web3point0trends.blogspot.com/. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

Korkmaz, B., Lee, R., and Park, I. (2011). How new Internet standards will finally deliver a mobile revolution. McKinsey Quarterly, (3), 47-53.

Na, D. Y., and DeRocher, B. C. (2011). HTML5: What’s Different for User Experience Design and the Web?. Connectivity and the User Experience, 45.

 

Padley, R. (2011). HTML5–bridging the mobile platform gap: mobile technologies in scholarly communication. Serials: The Journal for the Serials Community, 24, S32-S39.

 

World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). W3C Semantic Web Activity.  November 7, 2011. http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

Concerns around HTML5:

Broad adoption of HTML5 is currently slow; this means that the HTML5 standard will be modified to increase adoption speed. While organisations build new mobile apps, they should understand that there probably will be future rework. But I think this is better than creating device lock-in applications by building applications for specific devices (Costello and Prohaska, 2013).

HTML5 is a more effective and safer tool for delivering web content than previous versions. But like all new web technologies it introduces security risk factors. Risk factors like the new JavaScript capabilities that give more access to clients’ computer resources.  This means that geolocation, local resource, and local databases access can result in new geoprivacy and data leakage issues (Zhang, 2012). Integration that HTML5 has with web browsing devices offers new capabilities like access to the microphone, webcam and location awareness. These risk factors needs to be understood by the Organisations’ to make sure their clients’ are not compromised (James Lyne, HTML5 and Security on the new WEB).

References

Costello, T., and Prohaska, B. (2013). 2013 Trends and Strategies. IT Professional, 15(1), 64-64.

 

James Lyne, HTML5 and Security on the new WEB (Dec. 2011), http://www.sophos.com/medialibrary/PDFs/other/sophosHTMLSandsecurity.pdf. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

 

Maine, K. (2011, September 30). Percentage of web sites using HTML5. http://www.binvisions.com/articles/how-many-percentage-websites-using-HTML5. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

 

Zhang, H. (2012). Preparing for HTML5 Capabilities and Threats. ISACA Journal, 6, 49.

The impact of HTML5 on individuals:

Semantics and multimedia are the two main reasons why accessibility is easier with HTML5. Screen readers are able to access content easier with the new semantic tags like <nav>, <header>, <footer>, <section>, <aside>, etc. This will allow screen readers to provide a better experience for the visually impaired by examining the HTML document better.

As an example, consider a webpage designed by an author only interested in the average citizen using a standard web browser. If the designer used HTML5, the same webpage can be used by a mobile phone browser. Because HTML emphasises the meaning of the information the page holds rather than just the page’s presentation, the same page can be easily converted to small text, with heading which are in a bold font (Hickson, and Hyatt, 2011).

But it is more than just differences in font styles. Again, visually impaired users can use the same page with technology based around speech synthesis. Then the text can be read to the user instead of displaying it. Also the heading text can be voiced in a slower voice or different volume. Navigation is also simplified for these users as "jump to previous heading" or "jump to next heading" commands are understood by the browsers by understanding the outline of the document (Hickson, and Hyatt, 2011).

Relative content can be easily provided through the use of this information. Page index can be effectively generated by search engines, or subsection content can be provided from the results. Also table of content can be generated as tools will understand the headings of documents.

Third party media player like Flash Players and are a thing of the past,  with the new audio and video.  HTML5 tags video and audio and  will play correctly as most browsers support them (Behr, Jung, Keil, Drevensek, Zoellner, Eschler, and Fellner, 2010).

The ability to browse while you are offline is now enabled by HTML5. Through its local storage feature, which is not the same as cookies, but more like a client-side database which will persist even after the browser has closed or cookies deleted (Casario, Elst, Brown, Wormser, and Hanquez, 2011).

Users are now allowed to interact with content instead of just looking at results.  The <canvas> tag or better known as the HTML5 drawing tag,  allows users to experience a richer experience than previous platforms like Flash. HTML5 API enables dynamic web content like (Boulos, Warren, Gong, and Yue, 2010):

·         Offline storage database

·         Drag and Drop (DnD)

·         Document editing

·         Timed media playback

·         Browser history management

·         Games

Modern web-browsers like Firefox, Safari, Chrome, Opera, and IE9 all support HTML5. Even old browser like IE6 can support the new HTML5 tags by using JavaScript “shim”, browsers’ shortcomings are corrected by the script.

Mobile devices aren’t just a fade, more and more users will be using their smart phones to browse the website. Adobe isn’t building mobile flash applications anymore; and because most mobile web browsers have fully adopted HTML5; HTML5 is mobile ready and will give you both mobile web and normal browser web ability in one. Tags that optimise the mobile experience include (Bidelman, 2011):

·         Viewport: standard widths and viewpoint zoom settings.

·         Full screen browsing: Allows Apple and Windows mobile to display in full screen mode

·         Home Screen Icons: Allows favourites to be added to the home screen of Android and IOS mobile devices.

 References

Bidelman, E, (2011). "Mobifying" Your HTML5 Site. http://www.html5rocks.com/en/mobile/mobifying/. Retrieved 29 September 2013.

Behr, J., Jung, Y., Keil, J., Drevensek, T., Zoellner, M., Eschler, P., & Fellner, D. (2010, July). A scalable architecture for the HTML5/X3D integration model X3DOM. In Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Web 3D Technology (pp. 185-194). ACM.

Boulos, M., Warren, J., Gong, J., & Yue, P. (2010). Web GIS in practice VIII: HTML5 and the canvas element for interactive online mapping. International journal of health geographics, 9(1), 14.

Casario, M., Elst, P., Brown, C., Wormser, N., & Hanquez, C. (2011). HTML5 Local Storage. In HTML5 Solutions: Essential Techniques for HTML5 Developers (pp. 281-303). Apress.

 

Hickson, I., & Hyatt, D. (2011). HTML5: A vocabulary and associated APIs for HTML and XHTML. W3C Working Draft edition.

 

Mueller ,G, (2012). Should my website be developed using HTML5. http://www.1stwebdesigns.com/blog/web-design/should-my-website-be-developed-using-html5. Retrieved 29 September 2013.