Building on the gadget platform in Vista
If you aren't familiar with the Sidebar on Windows Vista, it is essentially a "dock" on the desktop that allows you to install and run various gadgets. Gadgets that ship with the operating system include a currency converter, a clock and a weather gadget. The "gadget industry" has become much larger than I would have expected (there is even a gadget conference later this month) but in the end, there is a lot of value to be gained by extracting bits of information and putting it front and center. Can that be the foundation of a business model? I very much doubt it, but with the gadget Sidebar on Vista, it acts as more of a complimentary technology which I think people will be very interested in tying into.
One thing I thought was very interesting is that all of the gadgets in Vista are built using Ajax and DHTML. When I first saw the gadgets I thought that they were all built on Windows Presentation Foundation but currently there is no support for building WPF gadgets; although this is something Microsoft is looking into. Microsoft has extended the HTML DOM with Sidebar and as a result, a lot of content providers who have invested in Ajax and DHTML will be able to quickly and easily build gadgets for their brands and applications. The best example of this would be something like Fox Sports writing a gadget that delivered sports scores and news which when clicked on, would take the user to the Fox Sports site.
It is an interesting way to get developers used to building mini-applications for Vista. Microsoft is going to expose some Vista-specific APIs including reading/writing to the file system and access to some system variables including temperature and system directories. According to Microsoft, the install process from a user perspective, is the same as any other application - when you install a gadget you will be prompted to confirm and it will warn you that you are giving the program access to your system. Developers however do not have to author an installation program. Microsoft has also enabled code signing signature so that bigger companies can sign their gadgets. This design is where things get interesting.
One of the things that I think is going to be so powerful about Adobe's Apollo is that it will allow companies to take their Ajax applications offline. Apollo is going to open up file system APIs so that you can really integrate your Ajax application with the desktop and use web technologies like DHTML and JavaScript to build desktop applications. Microsoft is providing that same functionality to Ajax developers via their gadget platform. I asked David Streams about the possibility of running full-fledged Ajax applications in Vista on top of the gadget platform. They said that while it was technically possible, for developers wanting to build full desktop software applications, WPF is the better technology to use. One thing David noted was that the developers targeting Vista find the learning curve for Windows Presentation Foundation to be small. Because you can do so much more with WPF, he didn't see a lot of adoption around full Ajax applications and the Sidebar. I tend to agree, but I think that enabling this kind of functionality within Vista may get more people to look at WPF as a development platform.
If developers build Ajax/DHTML gadgets and applications for Vista, they will undoubtedly find that there is so much more possible with the WPF platform. Just as I think Apollo will make Ajax developers take a long, hard look at Flash, I think this platform will make Ajax developers look at WPF. If Microsoft comes through on their promise to support WPF/E on the Mac, then that makes the platform all the more interesting.
I was fascinated to find out about Sidebar because I think it shows that Microsoft is trying hard when it comes to open standards and because it shows that they are serious about catering to a different section of developers. I'm sure the tie-ins between Atlas and the gadget platform will be close, but from what I heard, anyone with knowledge of JavaScript and DHTML can build widgets for Vista users - that's always a good thing.