And Jobs Gets a Nobel Prize for the Reality Distortion Field...

Grok Headline matches for And Jobs Gets a Nobel Prize for the Reality Distortion Field...

The Ajax reality distortion field

The Ajax reality distortion field 04/14/2005 03:33 PM

David Temkin raps it out.

WE spent five years trying to build a "Laszlo-like" rich media interface platform inside of Javascript and tehbrowser. Believe me this is one subject I know about.

I LOVE ODDpost and the Google Maps thingie and what people are doing with D HTML nowadays. Our weboutliner is in D HTML.

But lordy lordy lordy - do these folks have a reality distortion field up. David Temkin agrees. Or shall I say - I agree with him.

Ajax, Ajax, Ajax -- the buzzword has taken the Web world by storm. As it's been presented, A jax ("Asynchronous JavaScript + XML") is a new way of creating rich Internet applications by means of "standard, mature, and well-understood technologies" -- i.e., DHTML. This is the big draw of Ajax, and is the core of the hype.

It is indeed possible (and sometimes even desirable!) to create rich Internet applications using DHTML; I've been talking about this for some time. But the idea that DHTML technology is standard, mature and well-understood is accurate in only a theoretical way.

Until very recently, it was commonplace knowledge that DHTML doesn't work consistently across browsers, isn't maintainable, requires code forking, delivers limited fidelity and so on. And while perhaps this is still common knowledge among level-headed developers, somehow the introduction of the "Ajax" buzzword has induced Web-wide amnesia, and people are now under the illusion that creating full-scale applications in JavaScript is a simple proposition -- just throw in a little script here and there, and you have an app suitable for Web deployment. No new learning required, just a few clever hacks.

Welcome to the Ajax reality distrortion field.

This one post about replacing Flickr's Flash UI with a DHTML UI seems to sum up these contradictions rather concisely:

First, the developer, Neil Kandalgaonkar, writes that this DHTML version of the Flickr UI will work in more places that the Flash UI that Flickr uses:

"So what's wrong with Flickr's perfectly good Flash interface? Nothing. But maybe...you often use operating systems where Flash doesn't work, or doesn't work well."

But later in the post, Neil goes on to write:

"This is a hack that works in just one browser, Firefox. Developing cross-platform DHTML is much harder and more painful. Flash has a lot of advantages over DHTML; it's truly cross-platform, and can do much more special effects. If that works for Flickr, more power to them."

Well, that sounds rather different! Finally, when explaining why someone might be interested in what he's done, Neil writes:

"...you're a web developer and you are interested in this bleeding-edge Ajax stuff."

I'm confused. Isn't Ajax/DHTML "standard, mature, and well-understood"?

Just to be clear: I think what Neil has done is cool. But cool, bleeding edge, difficult and incompatible isn't what Ajax is supposed to be all about.

I sometimes think of how developers look at DHTML apps in terms of grading on a curve. A Laszlo-, Flash-, or Java-based RIA will typically receive all sorts of complaints from Web standards vigilantes about non-standard UI, accessibility issues, problems with bookmarking and deep linking, and incomptibility with search engine crawlers. But a similar app built using DHTML -- excuse me, "Ajax" -- elicits enthusiastic responses from the very same crowd like "Wow! Look at how cool this DHTML site is! Isn't that UI great?"

Of course a full Ajax/DHTML app has nearly identical issues with UI, accessibility, bookmarking, and search engines that other RIA technologies do; but they have the veneer of being "standard". And just to state the obvious, lest we forget: HTML as a standard for Web applications is in a precarious position, with the leading browser vendor actively working to define its own all-new markup language for networked applications, and other browser vendors creating a splinter group that diverges from the W3C to promote their own standards for Web applications.

Theoretically, DHTML is a standard. But to quote Yogi Berra: "In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is."

[David Temkin]

I couldn't have said it any better myself.

Airport Express and the Reality
Distortion Field

Airport Express and the Reality
Distortion Field 06/07/2004 03:36 PM
At the Wall Street Journal's D Conference near San Diego, Steve Jobs stole the morning stage with the announcement and...

"at the fraudulent Nobel Prize
nomination"

"at the fraudulent Nobel Prize
nomination" 03/24/2005 12:08 AM

Nobel Prize novelist Bellow dies

Nobel Prize novelist Bellow dies 04/06/2005 02:43 AM
Saul Bellow, the American novelist who won the Nobel Prize for works including Herzog, has died, aged 89.

nikka costa, nobel peace prize winner

nikka costa, nobel peace prize winner 02/13/2004 03:57 PM
she's reunited prince and wendy, ?uestlove and d'angelo, and next she'll be reuniting the Beatles

Shy 'Hero' Coetzee Collects Nobel
Literature Prize

Shy 'Hero' Coetzee Collects Nobel
Literature Prize 12/10/2003 12:44 PM
Reuters via Wired News Dec 10 2003 12:01PM ET

Dubious doctor touted as Nobel Prize
nominee by ... [Media Matters for
America]

Dubious doctor touted as Nobel Prize
nominee by ... [Media Matters for
America] 03/25/2005 07:18 PM
Would someone please nominate me for a Nobel Prize? Thank you .. renowned neurologist"

mediamatters.org/items/200503220009
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Cobalt Horizons Responds to DARPA Grand
ChallengeDesert Field Test of Robotic
Vehicles Offers $2 Million Prize

Cobalt Horizons Responds to DARPA Grand
ChallengeDesert Field Test of Robotic
Vehicles Offers $2 Million Prize 09/25/2004 02:15 AM
Cobalt Horizons is competing in the Grand Challenge Competition to send an autonomous ground vehicle through a US Government sponsored 150 mile obstacle course in the Mojave Desert. [PRWEB Sep 25, 2004]

PNI Sponsors Local Robotic Vehicle Team:
Desert Field Test of Robotic Vehicles
Offers $2 Million Prize

PNI Sponsors Local Robotic Vehicle Team:
Desert Field Test of Robotic Vehicles
Offers $2 Million Prize 12/17/2004 06:40 PM
Cobalt Horizons announced that PNI Corporation will support its efforts to win a $2 million prize in a Defense Department research and development initiative aimed at advancing robotics technologies for future military use. The initiative, known as the DARPA Grand Challenge, is a field test of fully autonomous ground vehicles to be conducted in the Mojave Desert on October 8, 2005. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is offering the $2 million to the vehicle that completes the course the fastest within a 10-hour period. [PRWEB Oct 20, 2004]

Getronics Field Force Utilizes USAT
Corp’s Wireless Services for Their Field
Technicians

Getronics Field Force Utilizes USAT
Corp’s Wireless Services for Their Field
Technicians 06/25/2004 02:00 AM
USAT Corp provides wireless data solution for national deployment to 1000 of Getronics' Field Technicians utilizing Sprint Wireless Data connectivity. [PRWEB Jun 25, 2004]

McNamara and data distortion

McNamara and data distortion 04/09/2004 04:01 PM
I recently saw The Fog of War, as one of my annual quota of about four movies that I will get to see at a movie theatre. An amazing film. I went into the movie prepared to be sympathetic to McNamara, and was impressed both by his thoughtfulness and by his arrogance. By the end of it, I was loathing McNamara all over again for his duplicity, with some of the same intensity as I felt during the Vietnam War. Remembering his obsession with numbers and with data, it also struck me that if, like him, you advertise your reliance on data gathered (or created) by other people for making your decisions, you are inviting people who have a stake in your decision to game it and muck with the data. That's how we got the inflated body counts. Not necessarily the smartest move on the part of a decision maker, especially one who so obviously thinks so highly of his own intelligence....

Virtual reality calms the chemo reality

Virtual reality calms the chemo reality 08/01/2004 08:03 AM
Chicago Tribune Aug 1 2004 12:13PM GMT

Medical Technology Leader Sysmex Selects
Metrix for Field Service Management:
Field Service Software Improves
Productivity of Service Operations

Medical Technology Leader Sysmex Selects
Metrix for Field Service Management:
Field Service Software Improves
Productivity of Service Operations 09/17/2004 02:49 AM
Metrix, Inc., a global leader in field service management software, today announced that it has expanded its fast-growing customer base to include Sysmex, a leading manufacturer of diagnostic systems for medical laboratories worldwide. [PRWEB Sep 17, 2004]

No Evidence Deliberate UK Distortion of
Iraq Intel

No Evidence Deliberate UK Distortion of
Iraq Intel 07/14/2004 10:12 AM
AP via ABCNEWS.com Jul 14 2004 2:24PM GMT

Boston.com / News / Nation / On the
stump, the art of distortion

Boston.com / News / Nation / On the
stump, the art of distortion 09/27/2004 09:19 AM
He just lies .. Boston Globe

boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/09/26/on_the_stump_the_ar t_of_distortion
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NYT - David Brooks: The Era of
Distortion - anti-Semitism and neo-con
conspiracy

NYT - David Brooks: The Era of
Distortion - anti-Semitism and neo-con
conspiracy 01/07/2004 06:58 PM
unhinged from reality .. The New York Times .. asks

nytimes.com/2004/01/06/opinion/06BROO.html
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iPod mini audio distortion problems
reported

iPod mini audio distortion problems
reported 04/12/2004 11:24 PM
Some iPod mini owners are reporting problems with the headphone jacks of the tiny digital music players...

Apple CEO creates a 'Reality Distortion
Field' that makes even skeptics nod
their heads in awe

Apple CEO creates a 'Reality Distortion
Field' that makes even skeptics nod
their heads in awe 06/29/2004 07:19 AM
SiliconValley.com Jun 29 2004 10:10AM GMT

A Philanthropist of Science Seeks to Be
Its Next Nobel

A Philanthropist of Science Seeks to Be
Its Next Nobel 04/18/2005 11:23 PM
Fred Kavli, a recently retired Norwegian engineer and businessman, is planning his own version of the Nobel Prizes.

Nobel Laureate Milosz Dies

Nobel Laureate Milosz Dies 08/15/2004 12:26 AM
Free Internet Press Aug 15 2004 4:09AM GMT

"Nobel laureate Saul Bellow dies at 89."

"Nobel laureate Saul Bellow dies at 89." 04/06/2005 11:52 PM
has passed away at the age of 89

sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2005/04/05/ente rtainment/e154342D12.DTL
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Focus on science, not prizes, say Nobel
winners

Focus on science, not prizes, say Nobel
winners 12/08/2003 08:24 PM
Straits Times Dec 8 2003 6:35PM ET

Nobel laureate poet Milosz dies

Nobel laureate poet Milosz dies 08/14/2004 06:44 AM
Polish Nobel Prize-winning poet Czeslaw Milosz, who campaigned against tyranny, dies aged 93 in Krakow.

Poland's Nobel Laureate Milosz Dead at
93

Poland's Nobel Laureate Milosz Dead at
93 08/14/2004 10:12 AM
Reuters via Wired News Aug 14 2004 1:33PM GMT

Julius Axelrod Dies at 92; Won Nobel in
Medicine

Julius Axelrod Dies at 92; Won Nobel in
Medicine 12/31/2004 03:52 AM
Julius Axelrod helped to discover how chemicals released by nerve cells in the brain regulate mood and behavior.

Nobel Laureate Applies to Become KAIST
President

Nobel Laureate Applies to Become KAIST
President 05/16/2004 05:00 AM
Hankooki May 16 2004 8:41AM GMT

Nobel Laureate Saul Bellow Dies at 89
(AP)

Nobel Laureate Saul Bellow Dies at 89
(AP) 04/05/2005 07:41 PM
AP - Nobel laureate Saul Bellow, a master of comic melancholy who in "Herzog," "Humboldt's Gift" and other novels both championed and mourned the soul's fate in the modern world, died Tuesday. He was 89.

Iran's Ebadi Collects Nobel, Swipes at
West

Iran's Ebadi Collects Nobel, Swipes at
West 12/10/2003 12:44 PM
Reuters via Wired News Dec 10 2003 12:01PM ET

Francis H.C. Crick, 88, Dies; DNA
Discovery Won Nobel (washingtonpost.com)

Francis H.C. Crick, 88, Dies; DNA
Discovery Won Nobel (washingtonpost.com) 07/29/2004 11:48 PM
washingtonpost.com - Francis H.C. Crick, 88, co-discoverer of one of the most important scientific findings of the 20th century, the recognition of the double helix structure of DNA as the blueprint to life, died Wednesday at San Diego's Thornton Hospital. He had colon cancer.

Develop facilities to stop brain drain:
Nobel laureate

Develop facilities to stop brain drain:
Nobel laureate 09/24/2004 01:55 AM
123Bharath.com Sep 24 2004 5:40AM GMT

Saul Bellow, Author and Nobel Winner,
Dead at 89 (Reuters)

Saul Bellow, Author and Nobel Winner,
Dead at 89 (Reuters) 04/05/2005 07:41 PM
Reuters - Saul Bellow, who rose from writing book reviews for $10 apiece to become one of America's greatest novelists after World War II, died on Tuesday, his friend and lawyer Walter Pozen said. He was 89.

Iran's Nobel Winner Vows to Find
Journalist Killer

Iran's Nobel Winner Vows to Find
Journalist Killer 07/25/2004 10:46 AM
Reuters via Wired News Jul 25 2004 1:43PM GMT

Nobel Winners Back Kerry, Say Bush
Ignores Science (Reuters)

Nobel Winners Back Kerry, Say Bush
Ignores Science (Reuters) 06/21/2004 07:06 PM
Reuters - Democrat John Kerry picked up the endorsement on Monday of 48 Nobel Prize-winning scientists who attacked President Bush for "compromising our future" by shortchanging scientific research.

Vanishing Jobs: Structural change in the
economy means many jobs are never going
to come back. 12/19

Vanishing Jobs: Structural change in the
economy means many jobs are never going
to come back. 12/19 12/20/2003 05:03 AM
It's been a long time since I heard anything positive about American programming jobs .. Those Good Paying Jobs Are Not Coming Back

money.cnn.com/2003/12/17/pf/q_nomorework/index.htm?cnn=yes
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Steve Jobs to Preview Mac OS X ''Tiger''
at WWDCSteve Jobs to Kick Off Apple's W

Steve Jobs to Preview Mac OS X ''Tiger''
at WWDCSteve Jobs to Kick Off Apple's W 05/04/2004 03:21 PM
Steve Jobs to Kick Off Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference 2004 with Preview of Mac OS X "Tiger"

Dual Jobs Make Jobs Chron 200's CEO Of
Year

Dual Jobs Make Jobs Chron 200's CEO Of
Year 05/03/2004 12:28 PM
"What [Steve Jobs] has done is a unique accomplishment. Both companies... weren't just successful. They're helping to reshape some industries." By Benny Evangelista and Matthew Yi, San Francisco Chronicle (via MyAppleMenu)

Reality Porn - Hot Reality Porn Reviews

Reality Porn - Hot Reality Porn Reviews 04/26/2004 06:49 PM
www.reality-porn.ws

reality-porn.ws
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Pixar vs. Apple, Jobs vs. Jobs

Pixar vs. Apple, Jobs vs. Jobs 08/05/2004 10:50 AM

Field

Field 04/09/2004 04:05 PM

Joe's article yesterday (See The Ether) reminded me of something I bumped into a while back about an artist's display in England called field.

Richard Box, the "Artist in Resident of the Department of Physics at the University of Bristol" assembled a display of 1301 flourescent tubes that are illuminated only by the ambient energy from high-voltage transmission lines.

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