What's all this about Dynamic HTML?

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What's all this about Dynamic HTML?

Anyone remember the "buzz" about Active X in its early days? Or the "buzz" about Dynamic HTML? "Buzz" manufactured by Microsoft evangelists? Microsoft touted them (one after the other) as the Next Big Thing to Bring The Web to Life - as long as it's not JAVA!

What's Microsoft Alternative to Java, NOW, here in 2000 AD?

XML.

Embraced and extended XML. ( Let's call it EEXML (TM))

With Microsoft-defined schemas in XML for business and medical information.

And it all works best with Microsoft BizTalk Server...and only Microsoft Internet Explorer understands this dialect of XML best...so they'll be sure to put it in every operating system they make. (Just you watch.)

Back in the Early Days...

Originally, Web Servers acted as file servers for Web Browsers. A Web Browser would request a file or a service by its Universal Resource Locator - URL. The items fetched by an HTTP or Web Server and sent back to a Web Browser looked the same every time they were fetched and viewed. Such unchanging, fixed files are called static.

Then Along Came CGI....

Along came CGI - the Common Gateway Interface Standard. Through CGI, Web Servers could now ask a CGI Script pinpointed by its URL to execute an action and return the results for transmission back to the requesting Web Browser. CGI Scripts could and even now do generate custom, on-the-fly HTML files. The World Wide Web got somewhat dynamic. These HTML files could be filled with the results of database queries, graphics generators, video camera pictures - in fact, ANYTHING that a stand-alone application could do and convert into a format to fit the CGI protocol.

Here are two examples - take a look at these CGI Script actions:

An interactive camera mounted on an antenna in the Bay Area of California, USA
Ask for an Internet-wide search on any subject you care to choose - just enter a word or phrase and submit the query:

And Then There Was Java...

Sun Microsystems and a man named James Gosling joined the Personal Digital Assistant action of the early 1990s. While Sun Microsystems never released a PDA (like the Apple Newton MessagePad or the General Magic/Sony Magic Link), James Gosling did develop a new, mobile interpreted computer language to run on PDAs and other consumer electronics devices. It got the name Java because the development team drank a lot of coffee. (No kidding.)

Java executes on a "virtual machine" - a simulated computer. The simulated computer is rewritten to run on different operating systems. Applications or programs written to run on the virtual machine don't care about what is running UNDERNEATH the virtual machine - they run exactly the SAME. The Java Virtual Machine "translates" or interprets the Java program into the actual machine language of the platform UNDERNEATH the virtual machine!

So here's the scoop on Java:

The same Java program will run on any machine that has the Java Virtual Machine already running on it. It can move from one operating system to another to another as long as it's interpreted by a Java virtual machine. If a Web Browser has the Java Virtual Machine built into it, then any HTML page it reads and parses with Java applications embedded in it can be DYNAMIC run in the Web Browser!

And Then Came Active X...

Active X is Microsoft's answer to "Dynamic HTML". Active X is a set of Microsoft's OLE controls designed for use with Internet protocols. Active X is a play on OCX - the 3 character extension of OLE objects used in Windows. Active X component objects behave just like today's drop-in component objects for Microsoft Visual Basic and Microsoft Visual C++. With so many years invested in the Component Object Model and Object Linking and Embedding (or OLE), it's no wonder that Microsoft repackaged its desktop client-server solution into Active X for the Internet. It didn't take as long as developing something new like Java and it's already familiar to those in the Windows world.

Active X needs today's complete infrastructure of OLE as found in the Microsoft Operating Systems, as implemented on the Apple Macintosh or as provided by the Microsoft Internet Explorer Web Browser to operate. The OLE infrastructure allows these Internet OCXs to operate in any Microsoft application that uses Microsoft OLE.

So here's the scoop on Active X:

The same Active X control will run on any machine that has the OLE supporting infrastructure already running on it. It can move from one operating system to another to another as long as it's supporting OLE. If a Web Browser has OLE support built into it, then any HTML page it reads and parses with Active X controls embedded in it can be DYNAMICALLY run in the Web Browser!