I read the title and had some first thoughts spring to mind, and didn't reach the same conclusion as the author. While cool it was, it was limited in reach, and I think you could go further with this analogy.
Treat every web site or address or endpoint as an object. Allow message passing as though the web were simply a single object-oriented system resident on the same computer. The definitions of the APIs are kept as standard, so the system "just works" with any site.
This is, of course, the vision of APIs. But could we do better? Could we make it closer to a true object-oriented system, even simpler to use? Not sure if it would make a big difference, but as we know, sometimes a simple thing that makes connections easier can make a huge difference (eg: XmlHttpRequest).
Make the web as easy as smalltalk. For every API, and eventually, every site. Not just the ones we decide to make language-specific libraries for. One library per language just interfaces with "the web" as a fully-generic API you can access as easily as any object.
Just thought I'd share this thought. Any thoughts or ideas?
Treat every web site or address or endpoint as an object. Allow message passing as though the web were simply a single object-oriented system resident on the same computer. The definitions of the APIs are kept as standard, so the system "just works" with any site.
This is, of course, the vision of APIs. But could we do better? Could we make it closer to a true object-oriented system, even simpler to use? Not sure if it would make a big difference, but as we know, sometimes a simple thing that makes connections easier can make a huge difference (eg: XmlHttpRequest).
Make the web as easy as smalltalk. For every API, and eventually, every site. Not just the ones we decide to make language-specific libraries for. One library per language just interfaces with "the web" as a fully-generic API you can access as easily as any object.
Just thought I'd share this thought. Any thoughts or ideas?