With the release of RichFaces 3.1, JBoss.org has delivered more Web 2.0 development capabilities on Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (EE). This latest update has built-in support for AJAX via Ajax4jsf, an AJAX framework on JavaServer Faces (JSF). Developers have a framework combined with a rich set of open source AJAX-enabled components out-of-the-box, eliminating the need to write any JavaScript for AJAX functionality.

Almost 75% of US Internet users watched videos online in July, up from 71.4% in March, according to comScore Networks. The monthly time spent watching videos went up to an average of 181 minutes per viewer in July from 145 minutes per viewer in March.

One of the more annoying aspects of Web 2.0, etc., is the injection of neologisms, protologisms, or just plan made up words. In fact, I do not think that I have heard a talk from my friends Jay Simons or David Meyer in the last year that has not included a protologism. (I like the word protologism better, since it indicates something not quite finished, completed, or even valid). This include words like 'folksonomy'.

Kaazing and Terracotta announced a strategic alliance to deliver the software industry's most scalable and advanced real-time Web 2.0 technology for financial systems, online gaming, online sports and news broadcasting applications. The seamless integration between Kaazing's real-time Rich Internet Application (RIA) solution, Enterprise Comet, and Terracotta's Network Attached Memory software enables Kaazing customers to create and deploy scalable mission-critical real-time Web 2.0 solutions, such as trading system clients, online betting applications, performance monitoring, RFID/GPS tracking systems, and sports and news broadcasting applications. Customers can also reduce time-to-market, increase accessibility to their real-time offerings, and improve service levels to their customers.

Social networking sites have taken off over the last few years, and for a long time there seemed to be a clear divide: Doostang, Ecademy, LinkedIn, and Xing for business networking vs. Facebook, Friendster, and MySpace for kids (be it high-school or college). Plus every network had their own particular and sometimes even unique focus (e.g. Musicians on MySpace, Harvard and MIT grads on Doostang, and lots of Europeans on Xing).

So, for those of you who were on the fence about building iPhone applications using Web 2.0 technologies, think about this: Your potential list of application users is about to grow beyond users of the iPhone, and will include a crapload of people buying new iPods. If you think about the ubiquitous nature of WiFi (well, semi-ubiquitous), you're going to have people with iPod Touches hitting your application from coffee shops, airports, offices, hotel lobbies, hotel rooms, conference and convention centers, and a lot of restaurants.

In a recent presentation I attended, the speaker warmed up with a couple of bulleted lists that outlined the agenda of the session before moving onto his third slide that was clearly many days, work of stitching together powerpoint glyphs and figures in a sort of three dimensional loop that attempted to show the progression of software APIs around the evolution of networked computing.

Capitalizing on the growth in SaaS solutions, Capgemini has announced services that support the adoption of Google Apps Premier Edition by large-scale enterprises. Partnering with Google enables Capgemini extends its portfolio of desktop solutions, enabling it to support more client employees, regardless of their locations, platforms and roles.

We recommend using TestMaker's scripting support to test AJAX applications. In TestMaker transform the TestGen4Web recorded file into a Jython script (use the Tools menu -> Import TestGen4Web) and change it to emit the HTTP calls to the target host that the JavaScript in your app is doing. Although you may need to learn Jython or one of the other support languages, you will not have to get a PHD degree. We are investigating a way to use Selenium and HTMLUnit and Rhino to record a test, transform it into a TestMaker test agent script, and then run it in the TestMaker environment.

This session consists of two parts. Part I deals with building secure RIA software and solutions from ground up. This involves applying lessons learnt from building traditional synchronous web applications without using AJAX. 1. Security Architecture Principles 2. Implementing Security Design Patterns 3. Secure programming practices Part II provides solutions to address existing security vulnerabilities in AJAX websites without having to perform expensive reengineering efforts. The practical solutions range from inserting authorizing client and server side logic in code (Low cost) to capturing the XMLHttpRequest traffic at the network level and performing required verification. (Higher cost)

SYS-CON Events announced today that 'AJAXWorld Conference & Expo 2007 West' main sponsorship opportunities are now sold-out! Limited number of expo and event sponsorship opportunities that are still available are expected to be completely sold before the end of the month. The new sponsors who joined the conference this week, and are not yet listed on the conference Website, will also be announced later in the week.

I will be teaching a one day Bootcamp course on Ajax at the AJAXWorld Conference in Santa Clara, California on September 23, 2007. Details are at http://aja xbootcamp.sys-con.com I will be expanding the Ajax construction tools section from the Ajax Bootcamp I taught in New York at the SOA World conference. I am very impressed with TIBCO GI and Sun jMaki

We're working on an iPhone-optimized version of Ta-da List. As I was working on some UI ideas, Ryan and I were talking about some of really cool things about designing for the iPhone. I remarked that I loved the constraints. For example, we know the exact screen size/resolution, we know the exact typeface, we know how the face renders on the screen, we know the colors, we know the browser, etc. Then Ryan nailed it: Designing for the iPhone is like a hybrid of print and web design.

The inaugural iTVCon - Internet Video Conference & Expo (November 12-13, 2007) is building out its program and the Conference Advisory Board is busy sorting through the hundreds of proposals for technical and strategic sessions that have been coming in. Final deadline for proposals is September 10, 2007.

The voice of your customer, employee, or partner is more important than ever. With Web 2.0 technology, they are connecting, sharing, educating, and influencing each other in ways that businesses have never experienced before. In this session, we'll share how enterprises can use AJAX widgets to customize and enhance customer and employee communities. Join us as we flip the lid and uncover the best ways to 'doctor up' blogs, chats, community meetings, group discussions and more.

In 2-5 years, SAP and Oracle will upgrade ERP applications to Web 2.0. However, a lack of standards, dominant frameworks, and IDEs inhibit mass AJAX adoption. Today, upgrading mission-critical applications with AJAX is considered risky. HP is working with industry-leading enterprises with high-volume e-commerce Web sites to understand and address performance validation issues for AJAX application testing, e.g., performance testing for multiple http calls per page refresh; testing for rich client-like user interactions; security testing; and dealing with the asynchronous nature of client/server communications and AJAX as the front end for SOA/composite applications. What's worked and what hasn't?

The Impact of Web 2.0 on Big, Successful Companies Rich Internet Applications and their related business models are inherently a more efficient way of creating and delivering software. With these models, start-ups can crash a $1B market and quickly take $100M of market share. Great - unless it was your $1B market, right? Developers building products with an existing franchise, as well as those seeking to establish market power, have opportunities and risks. What will it take to remain competitive and what do we need to focus on to become market and product leaders in Web 2.0?

ITerating, provider of a free Wiki-based software guide for open source, commercial, and hosted software, has announced the availability of a free Semantic Web service providing up-to-date information about more than 17,000 software products.

Most web mashups and Web 2.0 applications are based on data that is specifically prepared for the application, to make it easily accessible via HTTP and the AJAX client. But what about the rest of the data on the LAN? Why should that be treated differently? The preferred technique emerging from the experience of the Web is to make data directly available to RIAs through Data Services. These new Data Services support web-friendly REST interactions, giving RIAs direct access to the data. This enables simplier, higher performing AJAX applications on the desktop.

Zoho, the Web 2.0 software start-up, is bragging about beating Google to the punch and using Google's own Google Gears widgetry to make Zoho Writer, its online word processor, useable off-line as well as on - even if the job isn't completely done yet. When Google introduced Gears not long ago, it was widely assumed Google would use it to make its online Docs and Spreadsheets software usable off-line too.

CNBC's Julia Boorstin reports that 'Social Networking is so hot right now, Nielsen is launching a social network to FIND OUT what's hot. It's all very meta. Nielsen is launching 'Hey! Nielsen,' a social network to act as a buzztracker for what in the entertainment world is hot on the web. The idea is to tap into the wisdom of crowds--or more specifically the wisdom of the 'IN crowd' who wants to be webchatting about all the hottest TV, music, movies and web videos.'

Sequoia Capital, which backed Apple, Google, Cisco, Yahoo and YouTube, has put $15 million in Jive Software, the part-time open source start-up developing collaboration software that competes with Microsoft's Sharepoint and its Tellme acquisition. Jive's choice of backer for its first round supposedly puts it on the IPO track.

'For Zoho Writer, we added support for nine languages last week, comments and offline support this week, and yet another significant new feature will be added next week,' said Raju Vegesna, Zoho evangelist, as he announced that Zoho customers can now work with their Zoho Writer documents while offline via the new Go Offline feature in Zoho Writer.

What company, well-known for pushing the frontier of desktop-like user experience, has pioneered an open source platform that allows developers to combine the rich user interface capabilities of desktop client software with the universally accessible, no-download features of web-delivered applications?

'Lotus Expeditor is a flexible client infrastructure for composite applications that brings together a wide range of application types, from .NET, Eclipse and Java to Web 2.0,' said Larry Bowden, vice president of portals and interaction services, as IBM announced Lotus Expeditor 6.1.1 software ? new technology designed to arm professionals with the ability to mash-up information from different sources to create just-in-time applications.

Recently SOAWorld Magazine was the host of a conference on SOA and Web 2.0 in New York City. SOAWorld 2007 brought together an amazing group of IT professionals who helped describe and expand the definitions of SOA. Web 2.0 is more than just AJAX. RSS feeds and blogs provide new ways to publish and edit Internet-based content and form communities. Flash and a host of other technologies are going a long way to provide the rich Internet application landscape that may make the browser truly useable instead of downright annoying. In time, the plug-ins may replace the browser entirely, which would be a godsend (in my opinion at least).

Service-oriented architecture (SOA) efforts are typically thought of as a 'behind-the-scenes' solution. However, as SOA efforts have matured, enterprises have begun to focus on methods of improving SOA ROI by delivering these services to end-user communities via the Enterprise Mashup. Enterprise Mashups are compelling because they enable business users to self-integrate services from both inside and outside the corporate firewall in flexible, innovative ways, yet stay within the context of a security and governance framework that enterprises require.

Web 2.0 is one of the hottest things on the consumer Web, but where does it fit in the enterprise? What's the business value and how can developers use new Web 2.0 mashups to bring value to the line-of-business users? You'll hear all of this and more from Rod Smith, IBM Fellow and Vice President of the IBM Emerging Internet Technologies group. Rod will discuss what IBM is doing in the Web 2.0 space, give a demonstration of a mashup maker being developed by his team, and share lessons he's learned from joint Web 2.0 development projects with companies such as American Express, Dunn & Bradstreet, and Dow Jones.

In my annual informal review of social networks among our cousins and other people under 21 that are still fickle, Facebook has completely replaced MySpace in their lives. In fact, the only people I hear talking regularly about MySpace are a bit older and just learning about social networking. I know, I know, small sample size, but why are social networks so fleeting?

Nexaweb Technologies, provider of the leading standards-based platform for building and deploying Enterprise Web 2.0 (EW2.0) applications, announced its Summer 2007 eConference Series aimed at helping software developers, enterprise architects and technology executives learn best practices and strategies for building and deploying enterprise-class composite, ?mashup? and Rich Internet Applications (RIAs).

From the many reports of software glitches this week, (including an outage at all-the-rage social networking site Facebook), I decided to focus on a couple of interesting (to me, anyway) stories that have one thing in common: speed. The world of Formula One racing is not familiar to many Americans, and yet it is a wildly popular sport in other parts of the world. It also is seen as a crucial testing ground for many new automotive technologies that eventually find their way into the cars that we drive. Being an ex-European, I like to keep an eye on that sport, and so it was that this story caught my eye.

ThinkFree, the US arm of Haansoft, the Korean ISV that Office used to regularly take out in the alley and pummel around the kidneys until it finally called up the antitrust police, has integrated an online beta application called Docs that it created with Facebook so the Facebook crowd can publish, upload and share documents.

AJAXWorld Conference & Expo 2007 East sponsors included: Laszlo Systems (Diamond Sponsor), JackBe (Platinum Sponsor), Adobe (Platinum Sponsor), Cynergy (Platinum Sponsor), Backbase (Gold Sponsor) Google (Gold Sponsor), Nexaweb (Gold Sponsor), ICEsoft (Gold Sponsor), Oracle (Gold Sponsor), Helmi Technologies (Gold Sponsor), JetBrains (Gold Sponsor), TIBCO (Gold Sponsor), Kapow Technologies (Gold Sponsor), Sun Microsystems (Silver Sponsor), Parasoft (Silver Sponsor), Servoy (Silver Sponsor), Etelos (Silver Sponsor), Microsoft (Expo Plus Sponsor), Lightstreamer (Exhibitor Plus Sponsor), IT Mill (Exhibitor Plus Sponsor), FrogLogic (Exhibitor Plus Sponsor), ThinWire (Expo Sponsor), Quasar Tecnologies (Expo Sponsor), Zapatec (Exhibitor Plus Sponsor), MB Technologies Bindows (Exhibitor), OpenSpot (Exhibitor), ILOG (Exhibitor), Passport Corporation (Exhibitor), Addison-Wesley (Exhibitor), The Thomson Corporation (Exhibitor), Isomorphic Software-SmartClient (Exhibitor), Universal Mind (Exhibitor), Farata Systems (Exhibitor Plus), Manning Publications (AJAX Book Sponsor), Apress (AJAX Book Sponsor), Conference Guru (Media Sponsor), Flash Goddess (Media Sponsor), AJAXWorld Magazine (Media Sponsor), Web 2.0 Journal (Media Sponsor), SYS-CON.TV (Media Sponsor), IT Mill (Media Sponsor), Methods & Tools (Media Sponsor), Web 2.0 Journal (Media Sponsor), and OASIS (Association Sponsor).

Traditional business models have focused on a process and interaction model that hasn't changed for more than 100 years. This traditional model involves a hierarchical approach where there is an expectation that all good ideas come from the leaders at the top of the organization. This model creates barriers for fully utilizing the core knowledge and experiences of each and every individual within the enterprise. However, with the injection of some fundamental Web 2.0 technologies such as social networks, businesses can finally tap into the knowledge of all their employees, partners, and customers.

By any reckoning, the Internet and the World Wide Web have remade the way we do business. The ascendance of the Web-based enterprise has come to be seen as inevitable. But anyone who takes a hard look at the serious limitations of first-generation Web applications is likely to have a renewed sense of wonder at the spread of their adoption thus far. Users experimented with e-mail, instant messaging, and search engines and turned them into real communication, collaboration, and information-gathering tools. Those same business users endured their fitful interactions with static HTML pages and moved applications to the Web anyway because of the substantial savings promised by the shift.

SYS-CON Events announced today that Jon Ferraiolo will serve as the Technical Chair for the International AJAXWorld Conference & Expo 2007 West to take place on September 24-26, 2007, in Santa Clara, California. SYS-CON Media Group Publisher and Editorial Director Roger Strukhoff will serve as the Conference Chair for the event. Ferraiolo manages operations and leads many activities at the OpenAjax Alliance, an organization of leading vendors, open source projects, and companies using AJAX that are dedicated to the successful adoption of open and interoperable AJAX-based Web technologies. The prime objective is to accelerate customer success with AJAX by promoting a customer's ability to mix and match solutions from AJAX technology providers and by helping to drive the future of the AJAX ecosystem.

My talk went well, and I did talk briefly about how we should think about Web 3.0. I know other people have said it's the Semantic Web, and maybe that use of the name will stick. I'm with Tim Berners-Lee who says Web 2.0 is really what the web itself is about. He always intended it to be a two-way medium. First, I think of Web 2.0 as the Two-Way Web, the Read-Write Web, the Web of User-Generated Content. It's Flickr and blogs and wikis. It's everybody creating the medium for everyone else.

AJAXWorld 2007 West will take place on September 23-26, 2007, at the Santa Clara Convention Center, in Santa Clara, California, and will offer a new dedicated 'iPhone Track.' Another dedicated track will offer a comparative education opportunity for conference delegates on emerging RIA tools, including a Diamond track on OpenLaszlo and sessions on Microsoft's Silverlight, Adobe's AIR and Sun's JavaFX.

Many of us in the VC community have been quietly wondering about the state of Web 2.0 innovation. We aren't seeing much. Startup activity remains strong, but the consumer web landscape seems to be populated with the same bodies with different skins. Another video deal here; another social networking deal there, and social [feature] everywhere. The apogee of this Web 2.0 hit me on Friday when I was having lunch with my daughter in San Francisco. There was a conversation at the table next to us between a 30-something and a 50-something, The younger was explaining to the elder that they had web site with the following attributes

Laszlo Systems, a global leader in Rich Internet Application (RIA) software, today announced that it has appointed George Shahid as chief financial officer, Chris Helgeson as senior vice president of engineering, and Reid Thomas as senior vice president of worldwide sales and distribution. Continuing the company's momentum, today's news follows recent reports that Laszlo is growing at a strong pace, its technology having already served over 40 million people per month nationwide.