[wp-hackers] Let's whip WYSIWYG

[Denis de Bernardy]

> Firefox doesn't support XAML. IE doesn't support XUL. Safari, 
> Opera, Konqueror, OmniWeb and so on support neither. Is this 
> really a feasible option?

Sure. The translation from one to the other will inevitably be programmed by
someone. After all, and technically, the idea behind XPCom is that a
xul2xaml (or other) transformation exists.

Obviously, xaml isn't 'official' standard. But it will be the de facto
standard, since MS reportedly -- and rightly -- has no plans to get serious
about XForms. So, 2 or 3 years after Avalon ships, I'd expect a browser that
cannot read xaml to be comparable to a word processor that cannot read a
word document today.

In such a context, using Xforms for the admin interface on grounds it is the
'real' standard would be silly. And the folks behind FF, Opera, Konqueror,
Omniweb and so on would be crazy not to support xaml in a way or another.

> Besides, what advantages does it present?

The built-in widgets supposedly make things easier, more modular and more
maintainable than a DHTML interface. In particular when it comes to creating
a rather complex Wysiwyg tool such as the one being discussed here. That is
not to say it shouldn't be done with DHTML. Just that is will likely be a
rather complex thing to do.

D.