AJAX, Microsoft Office & Desktop Productivity Tools

Preston Gralla writes that sites leveraging Ajax Technology like Gmail, Google Maps, the Flickr photo-sharing site, or the Amazon A9 search site are all among the most popular sites that we are seeing getting used currently. The sites using AJAX(asynchronous JavaScript and XML) combining several existing technologies, including CSS, JavaScript, XHTML, XML, and XSLT, to build Web applications that look and work more like desktop software than they do Web sites. These provide a glimpse of the future, where broadband connections are everywhere available, probably bloated applications like Microsoft Office may not need to reside on the desktops. The future way could be just switch on the system, automatically connect to the Web, and you'll have productivity applications available just by heading to a Web site. While some may see AJAX a tad bit overstretched, the fact remains that the dominant desktop player Microsoft is behind the curve in adopting this new type of technology.As Preston sees it, in all its probability Google Office would be free, and have a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software obliviating the need for paying dollars to buy Microsoft Office. The future could very well be AJAX-built productivity suite.