news analysis

 

 

Wave is Google's attempt at reinventing email. Instead of the traditional asynchronous messaging system that email was built on, Wave focuses on 'hosted conversations'. In conventional email, messages are sent from one person's computer to one or more others, and then responses are sent back. The email client software on each computer then attempts to collate those messages into 'threads' that show how a conversation develops.

 

Messages are not sent from one email server to another in Wave. The whole conversation is hosted on a Google server, and participants can contribute to the conversation directly, so that all others can see their contributions in context. The system takes the best aspects of instant messaging, bulletin board systems, wikis and email, and merges them together. Conversations are based on a tree structure, which means that parts of the conversation can be restricted to a subset of users. Consequently, private mini-conversations can be conducted within the broader 'wave'.

 

 

Reinventing email 40 years after its birth is meaningful enough, but there is a more subtle significance to Google's efforts; it is conducting this reinvention in the browser. Wave is built in HTML 5, the latest (and still-to-be ratified) version of the hypertext markup language that the web was originally built on. HTML 5 is designed to further facilitate the production of web applications. 

 

Google is pushing the envelope so far with Wave that it has had to propose additions to HTML 5 to let it include some of the service's more esoteric features, such as dragging and dropping pictures directly from the desktop into a 'Wave', and having them replicated across all participants' computers.

 

This is leading companies like Google to promote cloud-based computing not just as a neat alternative to desktop software, but as an entirely new programming paradigm that will kill desktop software altogether. "The web has won," said Vic Gundotra, vice president of engineering at the company. "It has become the dominant programming model of our time."

 

 

But is the future of desktop software really in question? It has existed since the dawn of the PC, and like email, maybe its operating model is due for a revision. 

 

"These are a new breed of applications that were built to reside on the web, that were designed to appeal to end users, as opposed to fitting on client/server architectures," says Jeff Kaplan, Managing Director of analyst firm ThinkStrategies. "They have been packaged so that they could be procured on a subscription or pay-as-you-go basis." 

 

Such applications could be a significant force as companies look for ways to economize by avoiding large up-front payments for enterprise software. They provide other advantages, too, including eliminating the need for capital investments in new server hardware to service the applications locally.

 

What about the technical implications? Online software may one day have had a significant impact on the network, but things are changing. Historically, companies have provided software as an online service by streaming applications meant for the desktop using technologies from companies like Citrix, or using Windows Terminal Services. 

 

But modern technologies such as HTML 5 and asynchronous Java and XML (AJAX) have made it possible to deliver browser-based applications that don't require the same level of low-latency network performance as streamed applications. Furthermore, as WAN optimization technology such as file and object caching improves, we can begin to see the load on the network reduce even further with HTML-based online applications.

 

 

Wave has another significant aspect which will prove central to the notion of cloud computing in the future. Google uses the 'three Ps' when promoting the service: product, platform, and protocol. Wave is a product that can be used online, but the company has also opened up application programming interfaces that make it possible to integrate it with other services, such as blogs. And as an open source framework, it also serves as a platform that others can build on and add to. The idea of integrating online applications together using these APIs makes them potentially much more powerful than their desktop equivalents.

 

This concept of platforms is becoming fundamental to cloud computing. Salesforce, which cut its teeth providing online customer relationship management software, now offers Force.com, a cloud computing platform that lets users customize much of the underlying components including the database. Companies such as Veeva Systems are using this to develop online enterprise software for vertical sectors such as healthcare, indicating that the concept is beginning to appeal to enterprises. We may not see large companies adopting Wave instead of email clients yet (for one thing, there's the compliance and archiving situation to consider), but in certain areas, online solutions may present significant business opportunities. 

 

The other potentially disruptive effect of the move to online applications is on desktop operating systems. Windows dominates the market, of course, and Microsoft is generating considerable interest as it readies Windows 7 for commercial release this October. But the rise of netbooks – a relatively new category of PC designed to be cheap, thin and ultra-light – could see other web-focused operating systems moving into the spotlight. Acer is to sell netbooks running Google's open source Android operating system, for example, while another operating system called Jolicloud has been designed to take advantage of the small netbook screen's real estate while offering access to a host of web-focused applications.

 

Even Microsoft, which built its empire on desktop-based software, is trying gradually to move into online applications. For enterprise users, the opportunities that this online revolution presents are astounding.