Web 2.0 industry and Ajax Community boosted by OpenAjax Alliance

ARMONK, NY: OpenAjax Alliance, an open industry collaboration dedicated to developing and expanding Ajax, announced new partners and initiatives around the Ajax Community, signaling continued momentum for Ajax-based Web technologies.

The group has almost doubled its membership since the launch in February of 2006. The newest OpenAjax Alliance members include: The Ajaxian, American Greetings, Bling Software, Curl, edge IPK, eLink Business Innovations, ENOVIA, MatrixOne, Finetooth, The Front Side, Ikivo, ILOG, IN2, IT Mill, Javeline, JWAX, Merced Systems, Nitobi, OpenLink Software, Seagull Software, Sitepen, Sun Microsystems, Vertex Logic, Vircon, Webtide and Zoho.

The existing group of Alliance members include: Adobe, Backbase, BEA, Borland, the Dojo Foundation, Eclipse Foundation, Fair Isaac, Google, IBM, ICEsoft, Innoopract, Intel, JackBe, Laszlo Systems, Mozilla Corporation, Nexaweb, Novell, Openwave Systems, Opera, Oracle, Red Hat, SAP, Scalix, Software AG, Tibco, XML11, Zend and Zimbra.

"The momentum and benefits of the OpenAjax collaboration are important factors in advancing the adoption of Ajax technology across the industry," said Jon Ferraiolo, acting director of OpenAjax Alliance. "Ajax is a major phenomenon in the computer industry and will be the foundation of the next generation of the Web. Our mission is to accelerate customer success with Ajax through our technical and marketing activities" he added.

The Alliance launched its web site which outlines the group's strategic goals and publishes its first technology white paper. The OpenAjax Hub is a set of standard JavaScript functionalities defined by the OpenAjax Alliance, with strong focus on being small and fast, that addresses key interoperability issues that arise when multiple Ajax libraries are used within the same Web page. Version 1.0 of the OpenAjax Hub is targeted for early 2007.

OpenAjax alliance's goal is to serve as an industry catalyst so that an Ajax-enabled Web 2.0 can happen as quickly as possible. Through its technical committee activities, the alliance will address key Ajax interoperability issues so that developers can successfully use multiple Ajax technologies within the same Web application.

The set of technologies known as "OpenAjax" being developed and facilitated by the alliance will provide the following benefits to Web developers:

• Lower development costs and faster delivery of Web 2.0 innovations;
• Vendor choice and interoperability;
• and richer Web experience and greater collaboration that can be added incrementally to existing HTML Web sites or used for creating new applications.