Web 2.0 Programming
by: Kirk Jensen

In this article the term Web 2.0 programming is defined as well as the difference between Web 2.0 programming and Web 1.0 programming. The advantages and disadvantages of Web 2.0 programming are explained. Finally an opinion on Web 2.0 programmingis given.

The term Web 2.0 was coined by O’Reilly Media back in 2004 to mean a network to span across all network devices. It delivers software on a continually updating basis, where unique users can go in and post information on the fly and it is updated automatically to the web.

The following list is a general comparison of between Web 2.0 and Web 1.0 this will be broken down into specific comparisons.Web 2.0 and Web 1.0

The first comparison will be with Double Click and Google Adsense.

Double Click was the pioneer of the Internet ad service, where the users profile was created by their activity on the web. Consequently banner ads where generated this way as well. A major disadvantage was that Double click required the use to have a former sales contact with the company which limited this technology to larger companies. Overture and Google saw a need and improved upon an existing product thus Overture and Adsense was born. It was a format in which virtually any site could be catered to in terms of having a banner ad on it, which in turn offered consumer friendly text advertising. The lesson here is to create a customer self-service management system that reaches out to the entire web and not just the core. Other companies that have used this technology are eBay and Napster.

The second comparison is between Akamai and BitTorrent.

Akamai provided global Internet caching meaning a client browser requesting a specific file when is then sent to another website which gives you the index page of the source site of the file. From the source code you can parse it into your site as an image, video or audio file. The disadvantage here was the hoops one had to go through in order to get a file, plus the fact that they could only use the servers provided to them. Now take BitTorrent, every client is also a server, hence the more popular a file is the faster it can be downloaded because more clients or servers in this case that host the give file. Again the lesson here is to give the power to the people.

The next comparison is between personal website and blogs.

Now one should know what a personal website and what a blog is, but what classifies a blog as a Web 2.0 technology? One is the use of RSS feeds, what RSS stands for is “Real Simple Syndication” or “Rich Site Summary” depending on whom you ask. Basically you can put a remote blog or syndication on your site using an RSS feed for example the following RSS Feed, which is referencing another website’s syndication. Another factor that separates a blog from a personal website is the use of permalinks. A permalink is the specific URL for a given blog and/or syndication. Thus referencing this URL to another blog and/or syndication will automatically create a link to that blog or syndication, which in turn built reputation between bloging communities.

The difference between static and dynamic generated web sites.

With Web 1.0 technology the term WYSIWYG or What You See Is What You Get becomes very apparent. Then JavaScript came along and became the breaking scripting code to bridge the gap between Static and dynamic pages. Web 2.0 uses Ajax programming or (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) meaning JavaScript and XML coding work in unison with each other to create rich, dynamic web pages, CSS is also thrown into the mix.

The 7 Core Competencies of Web 2.0

The 7 core competencies according to O’Reilly Media are:

* Services, not packaged software, with cost-effective scalability
* Control over unique, hard-to-recreate data sources that get richer as more people use them
* Trusting users as co-developers
* Harnessing collective intelligence
* Leveraging the long tail through customer self-service
* Software above the level of a single device
* Lightweight user interfaces, development models, AND business models

Companies that are considered to be Web 2.0 are shown in the following list.

It is safe to say that many sites now days use a combination of both Web 1.0 and 2.0 technologies. A perfect example is gameznstuff.com that has a combination of both static and dynamic pages that use a content management system of Joomla that is considered to be more Web 2.0 based then Web 1.0. Connected to gameznstuff.com is the blog site as well as RSS feeds and a separate forum site as well.

So Web 2.0 based technology is gradually making its way as the prefered mainstrean tools to produce rich, dynamic generated web pages and online content.

Taken from articlecity.com