Ask HN: How to follow up prototype of open source equivalent of Adobe AIR?

3 points

15 years ago

Earlier this year I prototyped a very rough equivalent of Adobe AIR, please see http://code.google.com/p/deskml/ I haven't had a lot of time to push it forward so the first thing I have to do is make that time. Assuming I do so though I'm still seeking advice as to next steps. I'm just going to dump some concerns/questions out there.

Starting with concerns, it's coded in TCL. This presents several problems. First TCL is disparaged. Unfairly in my opinion, and not unlike how Javascript used to be disparaged. The fact that I was able to slightly modify a couple of open source projects in Tcl (a web server and a web browser) and then glue them together with fewer than twenty lines of code for my prototype, speaks to its ability.

Notice I say its ability, definitely not mine: I've barely programmed in Tcl, and that is part of my problem: I don't have the necessary acumen. And the disparagement means there's a dearth of Tcl talent. I've actually gotten a couple of top Tcl developers (Jeff Hobbs, David Welton) to briefly entertain the idea and respond two or three times to emails from me, but those efforts have died on the vine.

Still though I am convinced of the viability of this project and indeed I have even prototyped what I consider to be a potential killer application with it: ebooks that support embedded Javascript. Here is a URL with a link to downloads for that prototype.

http://www.chess.com/download/view/stauntons-footsteps

I feel liked I've pushed this as far as I myself personally can and I guess I'm looking for advice or even assistance or a co-founder. My interest is really in the front end aspects of it. Also I have a number of first and second degree contacts with parties who have started up successful businesses around browser technology or epub-publishing. My interest/skill is probably going to be around the front-end/middle-tier aspects of the project, I probably need more of a hardcore backend engineer with C chops (tkhtml3 the foundation of the hv3 browser that the project modifies, is written in C) who has Tcl experience or an interest.

Anyway thanks for any and all advice or hopefully interest in picking this up and running with it. I'm trusting nobody will just fork this and run with it, plus don't forget, I've got some serious industry contacts already. I think what this needs is some impetus and some polish and it will be ready to market more seriously. Thanks for entertaining this rambling.

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