Components on the Internet (Panel Session)

Abstract

The explosive emergence of the Internet forces us to rethink the traditional roles for client, server, and objects. Component technology has emerged as the way objects and frameworks are packaged for flexible object integration. In particular, components allow users who are not programmers to do their own integration. Up until now, components have mainly focused on object integration on end-users desktops and on a client: compound documents, application assembly, etc.Existing component models like OpenDoc and Microsoft's OLE/OCX/COM provide function for compound documents, persistence, scripting, inking, and code management (registration). A series of Internet scenarios are emerging that demand new kinds of components. These scenarios are thin clients (Internet terminals), virtual reality/rich multimedia clients, collaboration, and business data access. Each panelist will explore one of these scenarios for it's requirements on an Internet component model.