Oliver Steele of Laszlo Systems recently posted a good history of various browser-based application architectures. Most interesting is his definition of "client-side web applications" in contrast with Model 2 (or Model 2X) and other evolutions he calls Model3 and 4:
"In a client-side web application, a single web page (or its application equivalent) is downloaded. This application can generate a sequence of views on the client. Sometimes the client application requests a new dataset — typically in XML, or a protocol (RPC, SOAP) that is serialized to XML — but this dataset is read into the client application; it doesn’t replace it."
While a good definition and fine architecture, Oliver is making client-side web applications sound newer than they are. Wasn't this the whole idea behind Java Applets? Granted the first applets didn't have all the architectural pieces right (eg., port 80 issues and server architecture needed to be home grown), but many people who committed to applets in the late 90's ended up exactly as Oliver mentions. At Inovie our entire TeamCenter product was a judicious mix of java applets (Swing -- gag!) and HTML, all done as HTTP over port 80. For portions of the app that really benefited from a rich interface, a single applet was loaded, and as new views were requested, the applet communicated with the server to get new data. Great post, just adding some additional context.
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