It's been a while. We got such great response from the post about our new <html/>, I thought it was time to do it again. In 4.0, the Flash embedding and Flash/browser communications subsystem has been rewritten from the ground up. What does this mean for you? You can now reliably communicate across the Flash/browser javascript boundary, sending as much data in either direction as you need. You can use DHTML to deliver your UI, and use Flash for things it's great for, like playing audio and video. Your applications can degrade gracefully for users that don't have the Flash player installed. More importantly, Flash apps can be more tightly integrated with the HTML pages they live in than ever before. I predict a new wave of innovative mashups that take advantage of the strengths of HTML and Flash, without relying entirely on either one.

Before I say more, please take a look at this example. Go ahead and click the 'Load' button, and you should hear some audio playing. What's the big deal? All the UI elements you're interacting with are DHTML, which is communicating with a tiny laszlo SWF audio player embedded on the same page. As the audio plays in the Flash app, it sends events to update the position of the play head in the DHTML app. Clicking buttons in the DHTML app sends events to the Flash application, affecting audio playback. It's a small example, but it shows off the feature pretty well.

One thing this example doesn't show is how much data you can pass across the boundary. I just ran a test, and on my machine I was able to pass 700K into Flash in 72 ms, and get 700k of data out of Flash in 50ms. Pretty snappy, huh?

All of this works across Firefox Safari and IE, for flash 7 and up.

And, you can take advantage of the improved history feature to make your applications interact with the browser forward and back buttons - with bookmarking and deep linking to boot!

Many thanks to our friends at Dojo foundation for their stellar contributions to the community, in particular Brad Neuberg, author of the awesome dojo.flash module which is the basis of the new feature.

We are extremely pleased and proud to announce that OpenLaszlo 4.0 is now available. This is the first official release of the new multi-runtime edition of OpenLaszlo, complete with a native browser DHTML ("ajax") runtime, a heavily revamped Flash (7, 8, 9) runtime, and much more. With OpenLaszlo 4.0, you can compile source LZX applications for any supported target with a single mouse click.

OpenLaszlo 4.0 is available from http://www.openlaszlo.org/download
This release of OpenLaszlo is built on a new kernel architecture that abstracts away platform differences. Also, with OL4, we have switched to an inheritance-based class system that tracks the emerging ECMAScript 4 standard. These new language features have been implemented in the LFC core to support (and extend) JavaScript 2 `class` declarations portably. This means that the OpenLaszlo platform is well engineered to keep up with emerging JavaScript standards and to support new target runtimes.

In addition to literally hundreds of improvements to all aspects of the platform software and documentation, we have added new features, such as support for streaming media. The documentation tools have been re-implemented in order to to make them easier to maintain and also to give us more possibilities for arranging and accessing the data in the Reference Manual. Eventually, this will allow us to provide better cross-referencing, better indexing, more user control over presentation of information, and more options for printing and displaying the documentation.

We have put a lot of effort into improving our open source processes. The tools we use to build, test, and analyze OpenLaszlo have matured significantly with OL4. We have changed to using Subversion, for source control, in order to enable a more open development process. The build is now based on ant 1.6.5, rather than ant 1.5. We have created a new testing tool, lztest, for automated testing, to complement lzunit, our tool for application- and component-level testing. We have created a suite of benchmarks and benchmark analysis tools.

By any criterion, this is the most ambitious and significant release in the history of OpenLaszlo.

The OpenLaszlo project aspires to be truly open and inclusive. Raju Bitter, our OpenLaszlo community manager, is on board to answer questions, streamline processes, and generally make it easier for you to play a vital part in this platform's success.

Post questions and comments to laszlo-user@openlaszlo.org or to the OpenLaszlo Forum. Please report bugs, especially regressions from OpenLaszlo 3.x, to our bug database.

OpenLaszlo 4.0 is the culmination of a project that began more than a year ago, and it embodies the contributions of dozens of community members from around the world. Thank you, and congratulations to all!

In December 2006 I was approached by the Laszlo folks from San Mateo.They were looking for a community manager for the OpenLaszlo community. David Temkin asked me if I’d be interested in filling that position for Laszlo Systems. Wow, how exciting is that!? I’m a huge fan of the technology since October 2004 when Laszlo turned the Laszlo Presentation Server into the open-source OpenLaszlo project. And I’ve been working with the Laszlo Studios in 2006 on some projects, which was a great experience. But joining the company from out of the community was like a dream coming true for me.

So I went to San Mateo in January, spent an impressive week at the Laszlo Systems office in San Mateo meeting so many people whose names I’ve been seeing in the mailing lists, forums and whose blogs I’ve been reading. Many things around the OpenLaszlo project became much clearer to me when I gained insight into the development process of the OpenLaszlo platform. The development speed shown by the OpenLaszlo team was incredible. Almost the whole development team was gathered in San Mateo at that time. I remember a meeting when we set down to define which features would have to be implemented by the team in January. Jim Grandy and his team came up with an ever growing list of tasks. I thought to myself: How are they going to implement all of that by the end of January? Well, they did.

It’s a good thing to see the performance of the OpenLaszlo team, but there’s a problem connected to that: How can open-source community members be integrated into the development process and turned into committers? Especially the Flash runtime requires deep knowledge of the server internals once you get to the Laszlo Foundation Classes (LFC). With the new DHTML runtime it’s a lot easier to become involved in the server development. The JavaScript knowledge required is much more common among web developers. One of my major goals is to make the process of contribution to the OpenLaszlo server sources easier for outsiders. That process will be started right after the release of OpenLaszlo 4.0.

Does that mean that there are no outside contributors for the OpenLaszlo server? No, we have contributors from around the world. But most of those valuable activities take place in the area of LZX component development. We definitely are looking forward to increasing the number of contributors working on the runtime platform.

I have chosen a slogan for my work as a community manager: “Making the OpenLaszlo community shine!� What do I mean by that? Every community member using the OpenLaszlo technology invests time and energy into learning LZX, helping other community members in getting their problems solved, evangelizing OpenLaszlo and improving the OpenLaszlo server by delivering feedback and contributions. In an open-source community I consider the community members to be the heroes. So my job is to make you shine.

Every single one of you adopting OpenLaszlo is an important member of the community. We have many OpenLaszlo applications out there which we (the community) don’t know about. I want to feature those applications, show what great work you are doing. Single community members will be interviewed about their experiences with OpenLaszlo and the community. The interviews will then be posted in this blog, starting with a young developer from Hungary. We’ll hold global and local community meetings and make the OpenLaszlo experience a more personal one. I wish that many more of you get the chance to meet the awesome team around Jim Grandy and experience the openness around OpenLaszlo.

Making the community shine is nothing I can accomplish on my own. I need your help and support as well. So I’m asking you: Get back to me with positive and negative feedback, with ideas on how to improve our community. I hope that you’ll enjoy the community in the future as much I did in the last 2 1/2 years. OpenLaszlo's potential is huge: J2ME, mobile AJAX, SVG and Flash Lite, where will the server be heading in the next months and years? You all can play a role in defining the direction into which OpenLaszlo is moving and the success of this open-source project.

Raju Bitter
OpenLaszlo Community Manager

Laszlo Webtop allows you to deliver multiple applications inside an advanced framework and window management system. Coupled with its breakthrough user interface is a corresponding server-based SOA framework that provides advanced data management APIs, manages authentication and single-sign on, and includes other features that make a multi-application webtop a reality.

Based on OpenLaszlo, the leading open source RIA platform, Webtop not only delivers a Cinematic User Experienceâ„¢ in any browser, but also a complete workspace that consists of multiple components that integrate with each other, and a system to provide extensive visual styling and branding.

The Laszlo Webtop Early Access Program is designed for companies who are actively looking for an advanced Webtop framework to deploy internally or online. If you are interested in participating in this Early Access Program, please visit the Laszlo Webtop page.

Learn More > http://www.laszlosystems.com/software/webtop

With a sigh of relief, and a few virtual pats on the back, we released the official build of OpenLaszlo 4.0 B1 today. The downloads are available here, the release notes are here, and you can play with the live bits here.

We're pretty used to the idea by now, but even so it is still an amazing thing to see the full Laszlo-rific experience running natively in an HTML browser. Those of you new to OpenLaszlo 4.0 aka Legals should really take a look at Laszlo Explorer in a modern browser such as Firefox 2.0. Go through the Laszlo in 10 Minutes tutorial. Play with the Calendar. RIA? Ajax? Whatever you want to call it, it's pretty darn cool.

As for us: now back to work! Lots to be done for Beta 2, and even more before we call a final build. We've got a few ideas for how OL4 might be used, but I'm sure you'll surprise everyone with something completely unexpected. We can't wait to see what you'll do with it!

- Collaboration Brings Laszlo Systems’ Rich Internet Development Platform to Java Technology-enabled Devices -

SANTA CLARA and SAN MATEO, Calif. (October 10, 2006) – Sun Microsystems Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW), the creator and leading advocate of Java™ technology, and Laszlo Systems, Inc., the original developer of OpenLaszlo, a leading open source rich Internet development platform, today announced a collaboration to enable OpenLaszlo applications to run on devices supporting the Javaâ„¢ Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) application. With this move, Sun and Laszlo are actively contributing resources to a new project for the OpenLaszlo community, code-named Orbit.

With more than 3.8 billion Java devices including 1.2 billion Java technology-powered phones in the world today, Sun has one of the most widely distributed client runtime environments. OpenLaszlo is a widely adopted open source application development platform that uses Ajax-style programming techniques, integrating XML and JavaScript™, to create rich and robust online experiences. With this endeavor, Sun and Laszlo will work together to bridge OpenLaszlo’s expressive markup language, LZX, with the ubiquity and power of the Java ME platform.

OpenLaszlo, currently in version 3.3, was designed from its inception to support the instantaneous, no-download deployment of web applications on a diverse set of client runtime environments. Now with further extension to support the Java ME platform, OpenLaszlo will offer an unprecedented level of development portability and flexibility across a wide variety of Java technology-based phones, television set-top boxes, and other connected devices. Support for OpenLaszlo applications further enhances one of the key strengths of the Java platform – the ability to support development environments and authoring tools targeting a broad spectrum of developer skills and preferences.

"The integration of OpenLaszlo and Java ME technology is another important step in the evolution of mobile computing," said Robert Brewin, CTO of Sun Microsystems' software group. "This collaboration will bring the richness of the modern web, the power of Java technology and the unique capabilities of OpenLaszlo together for the benefit of our respective developer communities."

"We’re pleased to be working with Sun, which is a big step forward in furthering our collective vision of enabling seamless application support for all connected devices," said David Temkin, founder and CTO of Laszlo Systems. "With both companies' strong commitment to open source and open standards, today’s announcement marks a significant milestone towards those efforts."

Sun and Laszlo expect to release the first demonstrable Project Orbit application running under the Java ME platform later this year at www.openlaszlo.org. For more information on Project Orbit and its goals, please visit www.java.net or www.openlaszlo.org/orbit. To become a contributor to the Project, registration is available at www.openlaszlo.org/orbit.

About Sun Microsystems, Inc.

A singular vision -- "The Network Is The Computer" -- guides Sun in the development of technologies that power the world's most important markets. Sun's philosophy of sharing innovation and building communities is at the forefront of the next wave of computing: the Participation Age. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the Web at http://sun.com.

About Laszlo Systems

Laszlo Systems is the original developer of OpenLaszlo, the leading open source platform for building and deploying Web 2.0 applications. OpenLaszlo technology has been widely adopted by application and service providers in the consumer, enterprise, education and government markets. Laszlo Systems provides updates, training and support for OpenLaszlo and offers rich-experience web-based digital life applications such as Laszlo Mail, built on OpenLaszlo.

For more information about San Mateo, Calif.-based Laszlo Systems, visit www.laszlosystems.com.

We are excited to announce availability of the fourth snapshot of OpenLaszlo project "Legals". This snapshot showcases a breakthrough in our effort to bring OpenLaszlo to DHTML: we have many of the original OpenLaszlo Components running in DHTML, enough so that it is now feasible to quickly port existing applications from 3.3.x to Legals.

The PR4 snapshot is available from our Downloads page, or directly from Subversion.

To demonstrate what is possible with this snapshot, we have made available DHTML versions of two longstanding OpenLaszlo applications, Calendar and the Components Sampler. These two, and of course LZPIX, are available in Flash and DHTML from the Demos page. As a testament to how well this is going, the port of Calendar from OpenLaszlo 3.3.3 to Legals required changes to less than one percent of the application code.

Once again, please take a close look at Legals; if you are interested in helping to guide the evolution of the web there is no better place to get involved.

We are pleased to announce that the Legals PR2 snapshot is available at http://www.openlaszlo.org/download. You can try it out at http://labs.openlaszlo.org. The release notes can be found on the OpenLaszlo Download page.

The OpenLaszlo Legals PR2 snapshot represents the current state of the Legals project, the goal of which is to make OpenLaszlo a true multi-runtime environment by supporting DHTML, in addition to SWF.

Legals PR2 improves upon the previous snapshot, Legals PR1, and addresses two visible areas: expanded support for browser platforms (Windows IE 6.0 and Mac OS X Safari 2.0) and improvements to the DHTML developer tools. Specifically, Legals PR2 includes:

• Inital support for the LZPIX application running under DHTML in Internet Explorer version 6.0 on Microsoft Windows and running under DHTML in Safari 2.0 on Mac OS X. Try out these new browsers with the LZPIX demo application, which is available on openlaszlo.org. Keep in mind that the performance and functionality is not fully implemented and optimized for IE6 and Safari.
• Addition of a DHTML profiler, which is useful for identifying performance problems. You can find a description of the profiler and instructions for using it on the OpenLaszlo wiki Call Profiler page.

In addition, Legals PR2 includes ongoing changes to the OpenLaszlo architecture, making kernels to support the different runtimes and modifying the LFC to use the new architecture. Many of these changes have been discussed on the OpenLaszlo mailing lists, in addition to proposals on the OpenLaszlo wiki and task items in JIRA.

Take a look, a close look at all that is happening, and you will want to get involved. The Legals architecture has opened the door for a true multi-runtime platform that is creating unlimited possibilities. Be a part of it!

We are pleased to announce that OpenLaszlo 3.3.3 is available at http://www.openlaszlo.org/download. OpenLaszlo 3.3.3 is the next fully-qualified point release with supporting documentation in the 3.x series, which supports the Flash runtime only.

OpenLaszlo 3.3.3 addresses two regressions: a media loading problem and the usage of the lzc script compiler. OpenLaszlo 3.3.3 also helps prevent a potential security issue that could arise if you do not follow the recommended guidelines for deploying your application. The issues are summarized here:

• LPP-2131: Loading images quickly was causing the media loader to fail. This has been corrected.
• LPP-2118: lzc.bat and the lzc script compiler were not running correctly in a standard Windows XP configuration. This has been corrected. In addition, the documentation is incorrect about the directory where it should be run. The correct directory to run lzc is:
  /Program Files/OpenLaszlo Server 3.3.3/bin/lzc
• Potential security issue: If you deployed a developer's kit, instead of making a deployment package as directed in the Deployers Guide, there was a potential risk that the JSP files used by OpenLaszlo Explorer for remote compilation and source viewing could also be compromised to access the file system. We strongly recommend you follow the deployment instructions. As an added measure of safety, we have fixed all known potential security issues arising from JSP's.

Details can be found in the Release Notes, available at http://www.openlaszlo.org/download.

Yesterday we announced a strategic partnership with the Dojo Foundation: OpenLaszlo will not only be licensing the Dojo Toolkit for use within our next major release, we will also make substantial code contributions back to Dojo for use by the entire Ajax/DHTML community.

I'd like to write a little bit about why Dojo is a good choice for us and where we see it fitting into our platform architecture.

The Dojo connection came about as part of our current project to bring OpenLaszlo to multiple runtimes, and to DHTML. We are building separate kernels for each of our runtimes. These are small pieces of code, written in the native dialect of the target (ActionScript 2.0 for Flash 7 and 8, cross-browser JavaScript 1.4 for DHTML, and so on), and providing the runtime abstraction layer upon which the rest of the platform will rest. As we approached the design of the DHTML kernel, it seemed to us that the more we could leverage work being done in the Ajax/DHTML world the better that kernel would turn out.

Dojo quickly stood out as a toolkit with a mature design philosophy, committed and smart collaborators, and (crucially) a package system that would allow us to pick and choose features without adopting the entire toolkit. Our needs are specific, and low level: leak-free event handling, robust media loading, cross-browser DOM APIs, and so on. Dojo is able to provide many of these, so we decided to license it for use within the OpenLaszlo/DHTML kernel.

But Dojo doesn't provide everything we would want in a DHTML kernel. For example, our kernel exports the concept of a sprite—basically an interactive display primitive, implemented as a MovieClip in Flash 7 and 8, and as a DIV in DHTML. Our thought was: why not contribute these pieces back to Dojo? We're both open source, with compatible licenses, so a contribution like this repackages code we would write anyway in a form that can be re-used by the broadest possible audience. OpenLaszlo benefits from more smart engineers using and improving the kernel of our DHTML runtime, and the Ajax community gains new libraries within a mainstream toolkit.

Where are we now? The OpenLaszlo platform team is currently in the process of refactoring the LFC (Laszlo Foundation Classes) along a kernel API boundary, and has begun incorporating Dojo libraries into our rapidly-evolving DHTML kernel. We've also already benefited from the Dojo unit test infrastructure: we hope to support Rhino as a server-side unit test environment, and Dojo's support for that VM has helped us to bootstrap ourselves into Rhino. Once our kernel APIs and DHTML kernel stabilize we will be looking at what we can contribute back to Dojo.

These are exciting times! Dojo and OpenLaszlo are both participants in the birth of a new web-centric application technology, and it's great to be working with them so closely to make that happen.

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