Developer tools

In the battle between native apps and Web sites, an Italian startup called Apps Builder wants to help those on the Web side defect to the enemy.

The company offers a subscription-based Web service that converts Web sites into mobile applications. Last month it added Windows Phone app support to its earlier options--iOS, Android, HTML-based Web apps, and Chrome Web apps. And it's seeing some significant usage of its service.

Specifically, the company just passed the milestone of 20,000 apps developed through Apps Builder, and those apps have been downloaded a million times from their various app stores, … Read more

The dominance of Apple and Google mobile browsers is leading to a situation that's even worse for Web programming than the former dominance of Internet Explorer, a standards group leader warned today.

Daniel Glazman, co-chairman of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) group overseeing the formatting and effects standard called Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), said that programmers are overlooking other browsers when they use newer CSS features--even when those other browsers support the features.

The result is that those other browsers--Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Opera, chiefly--might have to essentially masquerade themselves as other browsers. When that happens, the "… Read more

Some of the Internet's most prominent companies are arguing a case in East Texas, claiming they don't violate patents related to the "Interactive Web."

Lawyers for Yahoo, Amazon, and YouTube, among other online giants, have descended on Tyler, Texas, to defend themselves against patent-infringement claims brought against them by a small firm, called Eolas Technologies.

Wired was first to report on the lawsuits.

Eolas has used its many patents to sue companies over the years. The company's best-known suit was against Microsoft, when it argued that the software giant's Internet Explorer used plug-ins and applets … Read more

Nginx, a Russian startup that has succeeded where others have failed at challenging the dominant Apache software for housing Web sites, has begun trying to convert its popularity into actual money.

Nginx (pronounced "engine X") yesterday unveiled corporate support offerings for the product, a traditional business model for open-source software. It offers three grades--Essential, Advanced, and Premium--with three- and twelve-month contracts for services including installation, configuration, performance tuning, and maintenance.

"Subscribers to the Advanced and Premium options receive design, implementation and optimization assistance, as well as prioritized development. Premium subscribers will have access to an additional set … Read more

Microsoft began distancing itself from browser plug-ins last year starting with Internet Explorer on Windows 8's Metro interface, but it spoke more definitively today: plug-ins are bad for the Web.

"Metro-style IE runs plug-in free to improve battery life as well as security, reliability, and privacy for consumers," said John Hrvatin, Internet Explorer program manager lead, in a blog post. "A plug-in free Web benefits consumers and developers and we all take part in the transition."

The upcoming IE10 browser doesn't just run in Metro, Microsoft's next-generation, touch-centric interface geared for tablets and … Read more

Mike Shaver already announced last year he was moving to Facebook after resigning as vice president of technical strategy for Firefox.

And now we know what he'll be doing there: engineering manager for Android app development.

Given the immense membership of Facebook, there are few mobile apps in the world that are as important as Facebook's. The company announced in December that Facebook has 800 million users.

Shaver tweeted on Friday, "This week I started as the eng mgr for Facebook's Android team. Doing cool stuff -- some probably obvious, some rather not. And hiring!" … Read more

The dividing line between writing books and writing programs just got a big step blurrier.

That's because Amazon has now released tools for creating books using Web technologies. Those tools include Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), used to describe Web pages, and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), used for formatting.

"Through the use of HTML5 and CSS3, KF8 allows publishers to create great-looking books in all categories, particularly those that require rich formatting and design, such as technical & engineering books and cookbooks," Amazon announced. Other features are well suited to graphic novels, comics, and kids' books, Amazon said. … Read more

Hoping to aid fancy typography on the Web, font powerhouse Monotype Imaging has released technology called MicroType Express (MTX) so it's free for public use, CNET has learned.

MTX is patented compression technology that shrinks font download sizes, hastening the moment when a person can see a Web page with its intended typography, but Monotype Imaging is releasing the technology under very liberal licensing terms. Microsoft licensed MTX for use in Internet Explorer, and now Monotype has won over another major browser maker, Google, the companies plan to announce today.

With its "make the Web faster" initiative, … Read more

Google hopes to better the Web with Dart, but Microsoft has declared itself an opponent of the programming language rather than a potentially valuable ally.

Google hopes Dart will address shortcomings in JavaScript, the programming language that endows Web sites with some brains. In a blog post yesterday, though, Microsoft said that improving JavaScript is the way to go.

Five members of Microsoft's JavaScript team said the Dart sales pitch argues "JavaScript has fundamental flaws, and to support these scenarios requires a 'clean break' from JavaScript...We disagree with this point of view."

Dart got off to a rough start, … Read more