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Web 1.75 Ready

I’ve just finished the latest update to HalfVast.com’s look and feel.  This is the first major overhaul I’ve made to the GUI  and addition of any significant features and capabilities since November 2006.   Back in 2006, Web 2.0 was the buzzword of the day and many web sites displayed a "Web 2.0 Ready" or "Web  2.0 Guaranteed" badge to indicate they were using the new Web 2.0 concepts.

At the time, I declared HalfVast.com "Web 1.5" ready and did a post explaining my rationale for doing so.  That included the following:

  • it did not fully utilize the technologies that are included in most definitions of Web 2.0, such as AJAX.
  • it did not implement the Semantic Web model
  • It did not have mashups in the true definition of the term.

With this latest update, I have indeed made some progress towards joining the Web 2.0 club:

  • Technologies – there is now quite a bit of content that is based on Ajax.  However, this is not due to much effort on my part; it has come as a result of the continuing enhancements and updates to the software (WordPress) that the site is built upon.
  • Semantic Web – again, some aspects of this are now present due to the new features and capabilities in WordPress and the 3rd party plugins used on the site.  Some examples are free tagging, tag clouds, widgets,  and improvements in the RSS capability.  But HalfVast.com still has a ways to go in this area, and, realistically, will probably never become a poster boy for the semantic web.
  • Mashups -   There are a few things here than can more or less classified as mashups such as the "Big Box" and the "Blogroll," but other than those two,  the site still does not make extensive use of mashups and probably never will.

A couple of other things included in the new design are a few bright, shiny backgrounds and cleaner typography that mark many "Web 2.0" sites.

And that’s why HalfVast.com is now officially "Web 1.75 Ready."

Web 1.5

Web 1.5 Badge

A few days back, someone asked me why I have declared HR’s halfVAST Blog as “100% Web 1.5 Guaranteed,” rather than “100% Web 2.0 Guaranteed.”  Well, the short answer is that because it isn’t Web 2.0.

Here is what halfVAST.com does:

  • uses xHTML 1.0 Strict as its markup language
  • uses CSS to separate layout from content
  • uses <table> tags for tabular data, not for layout
  • uses Javascript for some functions
  • uses PHP and Mysql for dynamic server-side applications and data management.

And here is what halfVAST.com doesn’t do:

  • it does not fully utilize the technologies that are included in most definitions of Web 2.0, such as AJAX.
  • it does not implement the Semantic Web model
  • It does not have mashups in the true definition of the term.

So I use the term “Web 1.5,” as I like to think halfVAST.com is indeed chasing the Web 2.0 Brass Ring, but still needs to take many more rides on the Carousel!

Many sites are advertised as “Web 2.0” or even “Web 3.0” based on their outward appearance…but as we all know, looks can be deceiving.  Sort of reminds me of the Plasma and LCD TV advertisements…some can display true HDTV out-of-the-box while others are “HDTV-Ready” and need an external tuner to provide true HDTV.  You typically have to read the fine print to determine which is offered with a particular make and model.