4 | Chapter 1: Introduction to the Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR)
Problems with Delivering Applications
via the Browser
As web applications have become more complex, they have
begun to push the boundaries of both the capabilities of the
browser and the usability of the application. As their popu-
larity grows, these issues become more apparent and impor-
tant and highlight the fact that there are still a number of
significant issues for both developers and end users when
deploying and using applications within the browser.
The web browser was originally designed to deliver and dis-
play HTML-based documents. Indeed, the basic design of
the browser has not significantly shifted from this purpose.
This fundamental conflict between document- and applica-
tion-focused functionality creates a number of problems
when deploying applications via the browser.
Conflicting UI
Applications deployed via the browser have their own user
interface, which often conflicts with the user interface of the
browser. This application within an application model often
results in user interfaces that conflict with and contradict
each other. This can lead to user confusion in the best cases,
and application failure in the worst cases. The classic exam-
ple of this is the browser’s Back button. The Back button
makes sense when browsing documents, but it does not
always make sense in the context of an application. Although
there are a number of solutions that attempt to solve this
problem, they are applied to applications inconsistently and
users may not know whether a specific application supports
the Back button, or whether it will force their application to
unload, causing it to lose its state and data.