I was reading this ZDNet blog about the Browser becoming the new Desktop [1], and one question came to mind. What happened to the promise of inter-operable parts of your computer environment?
About 15 years back, when computers were going to create the paperless office, all of the operating system and desktop teams were promising this glowing future when you could mix and match components seamlessly. You can have one spell checker, one email program, one internet interface, one text editor, one math interface (as for spreadsheet formulas), and so on. But they didn’t have to be from the same source! WordPerfect would work with 1-2-3 would work with Usenet (email), and their respective parts could be called up by your schedule program. This didn’t come to be.
Now, for example, you have one spell checker for each brand of each component. Microsoft did follow the Lotus model, and integrated text, spreadsheets, and email so that they share a spell checker. But there is no way to use the Microsoft spell checker from (for example) your web design program (unless you do buy it from MS). Nor can you use it from your browser, even if you are still shackled to IE. Sure, FireFox comes with spell checking, but you have to train it for your special needs from scratch.
It would be nice if I only had to remember one set of special formula commands that do the same things in several different programs, too.
But sadly, this promise faded away, possibly buried under the tons of paper records that office computers now generate for (as near as I can tell) strictly CYA reasons.
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