Social Glass

This image is a snapshot from my work laptop. I spend all of most of my working life in Firefox using web applications. I’ve have Google Docs and Spreadsheets open for collaboration with some of the guys back in Australia (I’m currently in Austria on a project), Basecamp for the project I’m managing, and several other web applications we’re building for our client. I’ve also got my most frequently visited sites on my Firefox bookmarks toolbar (is the bookmarks toolbar the next portal?).

It struck me how sophisticated web applications have become and how much I depend on my browser for work. Other than MS Office and Eclipse, I haven’t had to install a “thick client” for in about two years. And I think application development will increasingly be web-oriented, especially given the popularity of the SaaS model.

I can see a time in the not too distant future where the term “thick client” will appear in IT history text books. College students will read about these clunky applications IT departments had to deploy on each and every PC once upon a time. And I think Enterprise 2.0 adoption will be a key contributing factor toward the archival of non-web-oriented applications.