Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.
Re: Finally I dont have to keep secrets...
Author: Andrew Wooldridge Posted: 4/5/2000; 11:39:30 PM Topic: Finally I dont have to keep secrets... Msg #: 15984 (In response to 15979) Prev/Next: 15983 / 15985
Not to interrupt this great train of thought, but try to think really ambitiously - forget about browsers for a moment. There's nothing keeping someone from building a word processor, or a spreadsheet app or even an outliner out of these widgets. The thing you create using xul/js etc. doesnt have to be a browser. There are folks working on an IRC client, folks building an interface to Zope, etc. etc.And the cool thing is, you dont _have_ to use xul. If you just want to make a webpage with cool stuff - go right ahead. If you want to build an app-like thing - then XUL is there if you want to try it out.
There are also other goodies in this bag:
1) every module (like the http module or the xml interpreter) either already is or will be _scriptable_. Meaning it's interface will be accessable via javascript (and future langs).
2) another language called XBL (extensible bindings language) allows you to create your own widgets to use in XUL. for instance say you had an app which always had 2 dropdown menus plus an input field. You could create a widget of your own and call it "joe" whenever XUL saw your "joe" tag, it would put the two dropdowns and the input field.
XBL is how we create scrollbars, buttons, xul form controls, and more stuff. All configurable, editable, etc.
So if you wanted Mac-looking scrollbars, you could just swap out some gifs (pngs) and you have it!
Internally we have a really cool AQUA skin in works. It even has transparency!
3) There are many tags and stuff in XUL which could combine to make really cool apps. Just because we put together a browser, doesnt mean anyone else could build their own app. Poking around http://www.mozilla.org and http://lxr.mozilla.org can give you lots of insight.
This page was archived on 6/13/2001; 4:54:41 PM.
© Copyright 1998-2001 UserLand Software, Inc.