Recently the new WAC 2.0 Spec got out and it’s looking good.
Compared to WAC 1.0, the WAC 2.0 Spec is a shift into the right direction:
Instead of inventing new APIs, WAC 2.0 adheres to web standards like HTML5 and W3C Widget Packaging.

Let’s compare the two major spec revisions in that repsect:

As said before, the WAC 1.0 Spec described distinct APIs, e.g., for audio, messaging (SMS & email), camera and geo-location.

Taking photos, for example, involved assigning a callback to a global value inside the Camera object and invoking Camera’s captureImage method.

There’s a problem with that: What if two pieces of code both assign their own callback to that shared value?
The one which assigned its callback last will be executed. The first callback is “dead code”.
Of course this can be remedied by the app developer, but I believe it’s the library’s job to get something as essential as deferred execution right.
All WAC 1.0 APIs use this global callback model and inherit the problem.
There are better, more elegant ways to defer execution (e.g. dojo’s Deferred or node’s callback passing & EventEmitter).
And fortunately, WAC 2.0 replaced the old model with a callback passing approach.

If everything goes well, what could WAC provide developers with?

1. An easy way to package web apps “for home screens & app stores” by wrapping web apps in native container apps.
2. An extension of browsers’ capabilities to enable richer web apps. This includes APIs for camera and file access.
3. In contrast to alternatives WAC has a strong focus on carrier network APIs. This could enable purchase through carrier billing.
4. A security model to effectively protect user’s privacy and security.

So go ahead and look at what the new WAC 2.0 has to offer.
I’m excited to build apps with it once it’s running on some major platforms!

To conclude I’d like to end this post with my personal opinion on what I believe WAC needs to focus on to succeed:

1. WAC runtimes have to run at least on iOS, Android and a few other major-marketshare platforms. There’s no point in developing cross-platform web apps if you ignore major platforms.
2. WAC’s marketing & identity need to be more developer-centric. Different top-notch WAC runtimes need to be advertised by WAC. Ideally there would be an official runtime for each platform.
3. Apps built on top of WAC runtimes have to be compatible to major app stores. For example, imagine a developer is targeting Android and iOS. What if Apple rejected WAC-based apps because of, e.g., a bundled custom WebKit build? I’m pretty sure no sane developer would consider WAC if that effectively banned their app from ever going into the most profitable app store. And while there will be carrier-operated stores I am not overly confident in that. Human beings simply prefer one familiar store/market on their phone.
4. Web app developers want their code base functioning consistently across multiple platforms with little or no effort. This implies that different WAC runtimes should strictly respect the specification. If there are implementation differences it’ll result in multiple code branches in the app code to repair broken implementations. Well, if WAC wants to succeed this must not become an issue for the app developer! Most apps are going to need custom code to support physical device differences. So hey, it will be incredibly helpful if the basic APIs were consistently implemented! Please don’t screw this up, because I somehow doubt someone would develop a cross-WAC-platform JavaScript framework.
5. WAC 2.0 runtimes with the above properties should appear very soon. They also need to be advertised in an easy to understand manner.
6. WAC should stick to W3C specs & drafts for APIs. If an API becomes part of a given platform it should be removed from that platform’s WAC runtime. Think back to when Google removed Gears support from their own browser to make way for standardized APIs.

Enjoy the short video we prepared to give you an impression of what EventNinja can do

EventNinja in Action

The EventNinja widget contains multiple pages, as you are used to from mobile applications. The home page shows all the events, allows you to search and filter them. Along the top bar you have the search bar, the “Help” and the “About” pages linked.
Clicking on the icon to the right of each event takes you to the details page of the event, from where you can go to multiple other places, like the map, to see where it exactly takes place, the schedule of the event. If the event has twitter tags saved for it can go to a page which shows you all the latest twitter messages flying in. Try it on EventNinja.net and explore the features.

EventNinja Features

User Features

• List of web developer events
• Searchable and filterable by tags, location and full-text search
• Exact location of the event
• Watch all twitter messages for each event
• Find out about details of an event

Technology Features

• Events are stored, retrieved and filtered by a Google Calendar
• Everything built on top of the Dojo Toolkit
• pure HTML, CSS, JavaScript based widget
• using PhoneGap to run on iPhone, Android and Blackberry
• Plugin architecture, allows for a modular enhancement of the widget
• Fully customizable via client-side templates and CSS of course

As you figure right from the list of features and cleverly combining them we can hook this widget onto any calendar, customize the features (via plugins), style and brand it the way we like it and have your custom widget.

This gives customization a far broader meaning. Just imagine combining the two components 1) base of the widget and 2) the twitter plugin. You get a widget which shows you all tweets for a certain event -that’s just a new widget itself, without writing a line of new code. Which again is a very different use case, than the widget you get here. Just hook in another plugin which allows replying via twitter and you get a full blown twitter client in the context of events.
The limits of what is thinkable is just limited by the plugins you can write.

EventNinja for the mobile2.0 Conference

Mobile2.0 is the first conference where you can really use EventNinja to get all the info possible, the schedule, twitter messages, etc. There surely will follow many more conferences and events that EventNinja can and will be used at. See the screenshots below to get a feeling of what it looks like for this conference.

Are events missing?

EventNinja for webdevelopers is driven by the great amount of community events.
If you see that events are missing, please contact us and we will add them immediately. If you organize events yourself let us know as well. You can send any kind of info about the event, e.g. name, location, tags, speakers, twitter tags, schedule details, price, and much more.

You want an EventNinja?

Send an email to eventninja _ at _ uxebu.com if you are interested in a customized version of EventNinja, are interested in the technology or simply want to chat. At the mobile2.0 conference you will recognize us easily when you look for the guys with those caps, hurry, because we are spreading caps and maybe there will be many more wearing this cap :-).