I blinked, and web apps advanced ten years

Back in the day, we all watched static HTML pages give way to CGI, followed by MySQL and Perl, followed by Java middleware. Back then I wrote NanoCAD, but client-side Java applets never got traction. Now we have Flash and Silverlight and AJAX. On the server side we have PHP, and on the client side, Javascript, which is totally unrelated to Java. Many modern browsers now support the canvas tag. Kinda makes me want to recast NanoCAD in more modern technology.

Simultaneously we now have netbooks - small cheap wifi-connected laptops that can run a decent web browser and not much more. Google and others are pitching the idea that all our previously shrink-wrapped apps can therefore live in the cloud. It's an intriguing idea.

• Source code for a minimal AJAX example, demo here.
• There are several free webhosting services listed here.
• You can test whether your browser supports canvas tags here.
• I'm tinkering with a molecule viewing browser app here.
• More about Javascript
• A cool soft body Javascript app.
• Doug Crockford has written deeply insightful stuff from a linguistic perspective.
• Access to DOM: 1, 2, 3, 4
  
• Libraries: Prototype, Scriptaculous, and Dojo.
• Online "IDE" for Javascript.
• Tutorials and references
  
  • Javascript: 1, 2, 3
  • Canvas tag: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
    
• Videos
• Prototype
• Scriptaculous
• Dojo, including general discussion of Javascript
• Authoring interactive Adobe Flash content

When you're working in Java or Python, you can use an IDE like Idea or Idle. Is there anything like that for Javascript? I am not aware of it, if there is.