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Plane tickets booked, agenda resolved (Thanks Aaron) and we're on our way to Smalltalk Solutions 2004 in Seattle.

I've just received confirmation that I'll be presenting at Smalltalk Solutions. I've got two talks scheduled. One talk is about WithStyle and my second talk is about what Wizard is doing on the web and how we're doing it.

So without further ado, here are the abstracts for my presentations. The date and time of the presentations is still tentative.

Smalltalk WithStyle

Recent years have seen many software development projects moving away from desktop clients to Web Applications. Unfortunately, whilst today's Web Applications offer some benefits (particularly for implementors), they constitute a significant step backward for users. Usability and productivity suffer as user interfaces are 'dumbed-down' to fit a request-response model reminiscent of green-screen terminals. The IT industry has again manufactured new limitations that need not exist.

With:Style WebUI is a 100% Smalltalk user interface technology that frees user interfaces from the limitation of Web Browsers that were not designed to meet the UI requirements of business applications. The quality rendering capabilities of the With:Style technology prove the strength of Smalltalk as a first-class user interface platform that need not be fragmented and tied to Java or Windows-specific front-end technologies.

As a customisable XML presentation technology, With:Style offers many deployment models and even more possibilities for rich, 'hybrid' user interfaces through integration with Pollock. It fits in naturally with server-side Web applications and emerging Service Oriented Architectures. Demonstrations will include XML Editing and Scripting client-side behaviour with Smalltalk.

Smalltalk, XML on the Web

Although much XML-related work is being pursued in the systems integration and Web Services arenas, the way in which Object Oriented software can benefit from an XML Architecture at a more fundamental level has been largely overlooked. Software Architectures can benefit greatly from the unity and flexibility of a loosely-coupled XML-on-HTTP model that talks to Web Applications and Web Services natively. This experience report discusses how Wizard Information Services is adapting it's core applications architecture to be XML-based whilst taking full advantage of Smalltalk and its Object Oriented paradigm.

Wizard has taken business objects stored in a relational database and opened them up to the XML world by adding an XML server built on VisualAge's Server Smalltalk technology. Internal SOAP transactions are transparent to clients that may choose a simple HTTP access method. A powerful XML transaction infrastructure can then be built using the Apache Group's Cocoon XML publishing server on top of a Smalltalk server writing XSLT to process XML updates. This experience has provided some insight into the effectiveness of SOAP for running services in a Smalltalk image.