Richard Koman, newsfactor
The chief benefit right now is dramatically improving performance for MySpace's messaging system and enabling functions like search and sorting that the current system is unable to provide. Another benefit is the cost savings of moving all those client-server communications and processing to users' machines.
Faster, Smarter Messaging
On the TechCrunch blog, Michael Arrington explained the difference between the old and new systems. "Instead of scrolling through pages and pages of messages, users can now sort by date, from, status (read/unread), or subject. And, more importantly, users can also search the full text of messages. The results are shown instantly (think Outlook), without page refreshes."
In addition to the improved user experience, the cost savings could be substantial. A MySpace representative said 170 million messages move across the system every day, so moving a substantial amount of that data from servers to desktops could free up a large amount of server horsepower.
Fixing the Browser
He also demonstrated the ability to process geographic information within Google Maps to, as an example, locate all bars near San Francisco's Moscone Center, where the conference is being held. Some of these potential applications raise security concerns, however. "There has to be permission for using location data. We haven't figured out the best model yet," Prince said.
In the larger scheme, the work on Gears is clearly important to make the browser a full-fledged computing layer on top of whatever operating system a computer runs. "Our broader goal has always been to close the gap between Web apps and native apps by giving the browser new capabilities," Prince wrote on the official Google blog. "There is no shortage of Web application pain points to be addressed! In its second year, Gears will begin to tackle some of these problems."
Such a vision suggests that PCs in the future will operate on more of a "hybrid model because more functions can be ported from the desktop to the cloud," said Greg Sterling, principal analyst with Sterling Market Research, in a telephone interview. "To some degree this is the Mac and desktop Linux, because software compatibility isn't as important."
If Google is able to establish the Web layer as the place where development happens, the operating system may never become "irrelevant," Sterling said, but the distinction between operating systems is "less and less important."
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