Service-oriented rich client applications supported by Internetware browser middleware

Abstract

Since many web sites provide their own services and a web browser becomes a rich client platform, a new type of web application that is constructed by assembling web-delivered services in web browser, called Service-Oriented Rich Client (SoRC), emerges. Typical SoRC applications include web OSes and mashups. Due to the increasing complexity of SoRC, we propose a new type of middleware, which is embedded in web browsers and encapsulates reusable solutions for common problems of SoRC, including a container for component instances, a set of mechanisms for interactions within the browser, between the browser and server. Different SoRC applications can be constructed easily in high quality based on this middleware. We implement a prototype of the Internetware browser middleware, and then build two SoRC applications based on this prototype: 1) a web-based BPEL editor, iServiceStudio; 2) a mashup environment, iMashup.