IBM and dozen others have united to create an open source Ajax project to unify the lack of common tool for the popular technology of the day.
The project, called Open Ajax, aims to create a single framework that standardizes development and debugging on a common library of Ajax widgets that could run on multiple Ajax runtimes. Like J2EE before it, Open Ajax is all about assembling critical mass convergence around a stack to prevent Microsoft from co-opting it. And, like Linux before it, it’s about vendors trying to hop a train that was already leaving the station with or without their support.
The goal of Open Ajax is to standardize around a common set of widgets, interfaces, and plug-ins to Eclipse so it can morph into an industrial strength rich web development environment. And with the standards, any Eclipse-compliant Ajax toolkit should be able to plug into any compliant Ajax run time, regardless of browser client or server deployment platform.
Open Ajax is endorsed by IBM, BEA, Borland, the Dojo Foundation, Eclipse Foundation, Google, Laszlo Systems, Mozilla, Novell, Openwave, Oracle, Red Hat, Yahoo, Zend, and Zimbra.
[from Computer Business Review Online]