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Flash Outgrows The Browser

It makes a lot of sense. Adobe is running a project code-named Apollo to free Flash from its servitude as a Web browser plug-in and make it a full-fledged, stand-alone Web application client. Apollo would render HTML and PDF files as well as Flash animations, says an article on C|Net. Web-based apps are pushing the limits of Web browsers, and Apollo would let developers package up applications that would run both online and offline.

Significantly, Adobe joined the Open Ajax group this week. The meteoric rise of Ajax programming for Web applications underscores the limitations of browsers.

It's a little bit of deja vu all over again to see a company like Adobe moving to fill the market need for a rich desktop client. It wasn't too long ago that IBM's Lotus Notes was being dumped on from every direction for being too big and too difficult -- a dinosaur surrounded by Web browser mammals. But it looks like the world is coming its way again.

Yesterday in Boston Lotus General Manager Mike Rhodin previewed the Hannover client, the next major version of the Notes client. Hannover is built on the Eclipse platform, and from what I saw in the demo it will be very Ajax-y and open, with the ability to integrate all kinds of applications. It would be interesting if IBM decided the Notes client could stand on its own in the consumer market.

Adobe and IBM could find themselves going head-to-head for this new rich-client market -- which raises the question: where will Microsoft be? It's making some moves of its own about support for Web apps, but it looks like the software giant will be playing catch-up again, just like it did with Internet Explorer.

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