HTML5: Standards Are Only Half the Battle

Introduction

HTML5 has drawn critical-mass vendor support as the emerging web standard. It changes the classic "rich versus reach" decision in designing web apps. HTML5 will support richness, but varying browser implementations and support for greater richness will preserve a role for proprietary frameworks and native programming. HTML5's first beachhead will be smart mobile device platforms.

Features and benefits

Will guide web developers on choice of RIA development platform strategy.
Forecasts the role of HTML5 and its impact on mobile development platform rivals Adobe, Apple, and Microsoft.

Highlights

HTML5 will become one of the most successful upgrades of the HTML standard and a supporting player in the battle for dominance of m-commerce. Mobile devices will embrace HTML5 long before the desktop; Flash and Silverlight will not become obsolete overnight, as desktop refreshes will lag those of mobile.

HTML5 will not end fragmentation of mobile device runtimes. It will support more rudimentary use cases, with native, Flash, Java, and Silverlight competing for runtimes that require high richness.

The real battle will not be over runtime, but which players dominate higher value-added functions such as Digital Rights Management and access to digital marketplaces

Your key questions answered

How will HTML5 affect functionality for rendering and deploying RIA that previously required proprietary frameworks, third-party tools, and plug-ins?