Comments on: The Fortune Blog on AIR and “Creative Destruction” http://blog.digitalbackcountry.com/2007/07/the-fortune-blog-on-air-and-creative-destruction/ Just an average guy trying to drink above average beer. Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:01:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Doug Strickland http://blog.digitalbackcountry.com/2007/07/the-fortune-blog-on-air-and-creative-destruction/comment-page-1/#comment-3307 Doug Strickland Tue, 17 Jul 2007 19:47:31 +0000 http://blog.digitalbackcountry.com/?p=935#comment-3307 I think that there is a revolution forming that will eventually empower users to bridge the gap between what their software does and what they need it to do. I think that technologies like AIR offer a rich toolset for bridging those gaps. But remember in the same way that VB5 offered a new level of application development to the average user, the reality of application designs inherent complexity was never overcome simply by having a better tool. While it may have become easier to make a listbox control, it didn't become less likely that someone would do something silly with it. Where I see the 'front' of this revolution is in the current professional developer workflow. For years there have been designers that can do some front end code, and a few more middleware guys that knew enough about both ends to piece a prototype together, but the likelihood of there being an end to end guy was pretty low. this was due, I think, to the nature of the design work itself, not the tool. People that think in queries and data grids aren't the ones to understand visual hierarchy (for example). This leads to compromises built on the strengths and weaknesses of the developer. But with the creation of some of these frameworks, IDE's and other toolsets, some of that knowledge has been 'built in'. These n-generation tools provide standardized interfaces that are more familiar to each of the various roles, and allow them to stick with what they do best. Still, without understanding the actual mechanics of an async database call, they can create a very cool application that addresses their needs. I think that there is a revolution forming that will eventually empower users to bridge the gap between what their software does and what they need it to do. I think that technologies like AIR offer a rich toolset for bridging those gaps. But remember in the same way that VB5 offered a new level of application development to the average user, the reality of application designs inherent complexity was never overcome simply by having a better tool. While it may have become easier to make a listbox control, it didn’t become less likely that someone would do something silly with it.

Where I see the ‘front’ of this revolution is in the current professional developer workflow. For years there have been designers that can do some front end code, and a few more middleware guys that knew enough about both ends to piece a prototype together, but the likelihood of there being an end to end guy was pretty low. this was due, I think, to the nature of the design work itself, not the tool. People that think in queries and data grids aren’t the ones to understand visual hierarchy (for example). This leads to compromises built on the strengths and weaknesses of the developer. But with the creation of some of these frameworks, IDE’s and other toolsets, some of that knowledge has been ‘built in’. These n-generation tools provide standardized interfaces that are more familiar to each of the various roles, and allow them to stick with what they do best. Still, without understanding the actual mechanics of an async database call, they can create a very cool application that addresses their needs.

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