Third-party developers are giving mixed responses to the announcement that while they are welcome to create Web 2.0 applications that run on the iPhone, they are currently blocked from creating widgets that run locally on the device. “We’re a little disappointed,” said Daniel Waylonis, a software engineer at Google.
“It was not the announcement we were hoping for.” Although web-based applications have been heralded as the future of software, many developers at Apple’s WWDC conference were hoping for a true iPhone SDK. “Using Ajax for the iPhone is [bullcrap],” said French programmer Jacques Foucry.
Web programmer Dominique Baillon, a colleague of Foucry, agreed. “I’m quite comfortable with web applications, but I need something that I can run locally (on the iPhone) and that will work when I’m not connected to the internet.”