Ajax and the iPhone: great, but what about RSS?

So, Apple announced that the iPhone will be programmable, but only using HTML, CSS and Javascript.

Most people were pretty underwhelmed by this news - it sounds like Apple's quick fix to build a development community, and it probably is.

But this is a massive story. We will finally have a popular device whose developers will have to rely entirely on internet standards. The internet will receive another boost, as developers realise how much they can achieve - even Google Spreadsheets - and, after the kicking and screaming has subsided, I don't believe they'll want to look back to proprietary client technology.

After all, the desktop world is moving away from client applications towards the internet - and it's going to be the same on the smart phone.

Internet Apps, not Client Apps

Steve Jobs mentioned making a call and sending an email via Safari - I assume this means they'll support <a href="mailto:x@y.com">Email me</a> and <a href="callto:+112345">Call me</a> via HTML. At once, seamless integration with CRM and corporate directories will be straightforward.

Of course, this makes the decision to stick with GPRS, rather than 3G, even more strange. Download speeds will be pitiful once you're outside a Wifi connection. Surely they'll produce a 3G model soon, especially for Europe?

Offline RSS

I'd love to see offline RSS in the iPhone. If it synched your RSS feeds every time you hit a Wifi zone, and stored them locally for offline access, that would be a tremendous win.

After all, what is iTunes.com but a personalized RSS feed of music and video files? If your phone wirelessly synched up with iTunes.com, you wouldn't need to touch your PC!

And offline RSS would also allow me to synchronize with corporate files, Google's Picasa, news, and much more.

If that's not a good programming API, I don't know what is!

The internet applications gold rush

The golden age for internet applications is now - surpassing even the dot-com era of the late 90s. The technology, infrastructure and understanding of the power of the internet has reached critical mass.

I believe that for any industry, a couple of experts could put together - in a single day - a revolutionary business plan for automating its key processes, using the internet. It's that easy!

All you have to do is map out existing tools against the end to end processes, spot the gaps, apply standard internet advantages (collaboration, accessibility, open standards) and keep an open mind, and inspiration will quickly strike.

For example, retail banking: one of their critical business processes is fulfilling transactions. Why shouldn't I be able to

• subscribe to a secure RSS / Atom feed of my statement
• tag, star, annotate, and search for each statement entry
• click on hyperlinks from each statement entry to the relevant retailor's receipt and product description
• use customized graphs, charts and tables to analyze my statement
• use the same chip + pin security to log into my online statement as for when I make purchases
• accept secure payments from anyone else, using chip + pin
• make customized standing orders; for example, automatically transferring 70% of my balance every day, so long I have more than £1000
• Be part of an online community for sharing financial advice, information, and transactions.
• arrange private loans online with community members, facilitated with credit checks, legal agreements, online community-based reputation, loan insurance, and various interest rate options and calculations
• allow community collaboration, so I can list other users that have view (filtered or full), add (make transactions), edit (annotate, tag, star my statement entries), or delete (cancel transactions) permissions to my statement.

You might have thought financial services was pretty automated already. But based on a 10-minute brainstorm, it's clearly missing the internet touch!

In this blog, I've already applied the same techniques to the media, telecommunications, and content management industries. That's just the start.

But if I can do it, then other people can, too. Expect an avalanche of internet start-ups across a huge range of industries. This will revolutionize our world!

Replacing F1 through F12 with browser keys

Traditionally, keyboards come with function keys - F1 through F12.

These keys are all wrong. It's not clear what they do, in any given application or OS. They take up valuable space and in my experience merely add confusion - they're way too abstract.

I would advocate the following four keyboard buttons instead:

• Home
• Back
• Forward
• Refresh

These actions have proved their worth on the web. They're simple, easily understood, and very powerful. They exert pressure on the software developer to program the right way.

Putting them clearly on the keyboard would make web browsing a much better experience, by reducing unnecessary use of the mouse.

It would also increase consistency with smaller devices, such as the iPhone or Blackberry - even if you don't have a QWERTY keyboard, you still need to navigate around.

And other applications - such as email on Blackberry - could easily use them too, bringing a standard user interface framework to computers.