> > > >Please correct me if this is wrong. > > What is the big difference between "web frontend" and a "normal GUI"? >Can't >you do everything in the "web frontnend" that you do in "normal GUI"? >
No, not at all. The web is bound by HTTP and HTML. This comes with many ramifications. There are three main areas where I have and you will run into problems: - Real-time data updates. HTTP is stateless: it serves up the page then closes the connection. Any updating involves a round-trip back to the server. In traditional GUI, you just hold a db connection and repaint the areas that are updated. - State maintenance. Since it is stateless, you have to jump through a lot of hoops to realize that two requests are coming from the same person, since they could be handled by two different child processes or even two different servers. This has all sorts of ramifications on user login, user preferences, where the user was in the application, etc... you have to do a lot of work on the server side to realize that it's the same client that keeps talking to you. - Fancy interface widgets/layouts. HTML/CSS/JavaScript/DHTML can only get you so far. If you need fancy menu types, forms, layouts, etc... it quickly becomes tedious/impossible on the web. This is just the tip of the iceberg. -Fran
