D for the web?

[F i L]

Marco Leise wrote:
> I'm not so keen on turning browsers into operating systems 
> though. It is very difficult on the one hand to write such a 
> browser, which shrinks the market, and we already have a good 
> selection of operating systems and desktop environments, 
> together with transparent storage of personal data, temporary 
> files and configuration. Not to mention installers/uninstallers 
> and the rest of the software infrastructure.

I'm didn't mean browsers the way they are today. I meant OS's 
that "browse" powerful applications in an entirely care-free way, 
from a security and memory management standpoint. Browser tabs 
and "back" functionality are logical workspace and memory 
management designs IMO.


> Sun invented Java Web Start. Isn't that a technology that
> can serve the same purpose, without running the application
> in a  browser tab?

I'm unfamiliar with Java Web Start, but if it's anything like 
MS's ActiveX plugin (which is commonly compared to NaCL) then it 
differs from NaCL in one major way: security. ActiveX could run 
native native code in a browser as well, and Java applets got 
pretty close. The problem is that those plugins can harm you 
system, whereas NaCL cannot. Every machine instruction in NaCL is 
sandboxed and checked for malicious intent before it's deemed 
execute-ready and ran. You can check out some NaCL games made 
with Unity3D on Google's webstore. Search "Chordy" or "Sleepy 
Jack".