Web2.0
This phrase, making reference to the next-generation of internet technologies, is best (only!) defined by its distinctive features. These features most prominently include use of Really Simple Syndication to contruct feeds, the capacity to ‘share’ documents or information in a movement known as Social Networking, and the use of AJAX to make a site function more like an application than a static web page.
RSS
RSS, short for Really Simple Syndication, utilizes XML (eXtensible Markup Language) name-value pairs to build a page containing text and links to media. This technology is the foundation for Podcasts, which uses a special format of name-value pairs for iTunes to get the latest feed from a feed publisher. Most blogging software automatically builds RSS feeds of posts or comments which can be submitted to “RSS Readers” so that you can be automatically notified of updates to a blog without actually needing to periodically check the blog. This is a critical piece to understanding RSS and Web2.0: I have one page (such as a personalized google home page) where the feeds of all my friends’ blogs can be assembled, and I only need to go to that one page to get the updates on everyone. Feeds from news services can also be put there, and now I have a personalized internet portal with all the information I need without needing to visit everyone’s individual site.
Social Networking
As clearly recognized from the ways that RSS feeds are implemented above, the world is getting smaller. Web2.0 technologies allow for people to communicate and collaborate in ways that were previously not available. Great examples of this include Google Spreadsheets and Google Calendar. Spreadsheets gives you the capacity to share a document you create for others to either view or edit. depending on the permissions you give them. Two people can work on the same document at the same time, and it will list the users concurrently working on a document. Calendar also allows multiple people to own a single calendar, but more importantly, it allows for you to see friends’ calendars layered on top of your own. Now, I need only look at a single calendar and see what everyone has going on this week. Events can also be copied from friends’ calendars to your own, and users can be invited to events to track expected attendance and share information about that event. And, of course, RSS feeds can be generated from your calendar, ready to import into any RSS reader or other Web2.0 application.
Application-esque
As you can see, web sites such as Google Spreadsheets and Calendar are not referred to as web sites, but as applications. This third distinctive of Web2.0 technologies creates the impression that you are working with an application, and not on a web page. This is accomplished through the use of Asynchronous Javascript And XML. AJAX allows for portions of the page to communicate with the server and even redisplay information without needing to refresh the page. This may not sound like a big deal, but it has shown to completely change the way a user interacts with a web page. Google Spreadsheets would hardly have taken off if everytime you wanted to save the page or recalculate fields would have required clicking the submit button. This unexpectedly transcends the look-and-feel aspect of web design and into the realm of functionality.
In honor of Web2.0, I will be creating a new category and posting blurbs on websites that take advantage of this in creative ways. Hopefully this will involve a project I am working on at NPH that has begun to lean towards an AJAX implementation!