Evans & Chambers Technology

What’s so Web 2.0 about this site?

The term Web 2.0 describes new trends in the design and development that started appearing across an increasing number of web successful web sites several years ago. Although some believe the term is simply a marketing buzzword wrapped around existing technologies, the reality is that Web 2.0 can solve some of the gigantic problems that our Government customers face. Tim O’Reilly, who originated the term in 2003, asserts in his article ‘What Is Web 2.0′ that Web 2.0 marks a turning point in the web just after the dot-com collapse. The companies that survived the collapse seemed to have some things in common. An analysis of those commonalities brings us to a better understanding of what Web 2.0 really means.

While I would not consider it strictly Web 2.0, lets analyze the Web 2.0 qualities of this web site:

1. Usage of contemporary graphic design techniques. Effects such as gradients, soft shadows, rounded corners, and simplified layouts. A clean interface removes the fluff and places more importance on the data within the site, which is important since the data in a true Web 2.0 site is constantly and unpredictably changing.
2. Big fonts in headers. This is a return to HTML’s origins when the size of the text indicated it’s relative importance on the page.
3. Use of Open Source software. The new web is all about sharing, and so is Open Source. We utilize PHP, MySQL, WordPress, and Eclipse in the development of this site.
4. A blog. Any true blog brings other associated Web 2.0 ideals including an RSS feed, usage of tagging (“folksonomy”), a tagcloud, widgets, and user comments.
5. CSS layouts instead of HTML table-based where possible. Saves on bandwidth, maintainability of the site, and cross-platform accessibility (laptop, iPhone, high-tech refridgerator).
6. XHTML and CSS passes validation. This improves likelyhood that the site will work across browser versions and platforms.  The (X) in XHTML stands for “extensible”. By using XHTML strict, you are ensuring your pages will display correctly in a broad variety of devices for years to come … a very important concept for large, portable and long-sustaining web projects.
7. Web accessibility. The entire site provides for screen readers for the vision impaired, high contrast for the color blind, and doesn’t require specific knowledge or abilities to utilize.

Other aspects of a Web 2.0 site that are not incorporated into this site (yet):

1. Use of Ajax. This is an integral part of anything Web 2.0. It allows for page updates without needed to refresh the screen, which makes for a user experience previously uknown on the web, see Meebo.com or Netflix for examples.
2. The Wiki. The ultimate manifestation of user generated content, the wiki enables collaboration, which is another hallmark of Web 2.o.
3. Web services. These allow for the newly popular mashups and REST/XML/JSON based APIs allowing interaction between sites and more ways for the user to take control.