End-user programming of web-native interactive applications

Abstract

Web 2.0 has enabled Web users to create and share a variety of hyper-text based artifacts including embedded images, sound, and video on the Web. Creating Web-based interactive artifacts such as computer games, however, has remained a challenge: to end users due to the lack of end user programming tools; and to programmers due to the poor interactivity performance of the Web. With the emergence of HTML5 and improving performance of JavaScript engines, professional Web programmers have only just begun to develop Web-native interactive artifacts. Today's standard Web technologies make the Web a hospitable platform for efficient interactive applications both for professional programmers and end-users. With proper support, in tools and languages, end-user programming of interactive applications is feasible. In this paper, we review the current state of Web application development and the possibilities and potential benefits of end-user programming on the Web. We will use a case study, AgentWeb, a Web-based end-user development environment, as a representative of interactive Web applications. It is based completely on open Web technologies, rather than on any proprietary technologies. Given that 2D graphic interactive applications may be developed and efficiently executed on the Web, we discuss some of the potential applications in educational settings, including individual and collaborative learning.