I’ve previously identified a few elements that are needed to make a successful web based application. Since then, I’ve been prototyping, designing, coding on the bus and while making dinner, and have a pared down, minimal proof of concept for a few of those.
- XMLHttpRequest: I’ve verified XMLHttpRequest works with my wife’s iPhone. I expected it to, but had to make sure. This is the core Javascript call for dynamic web pages that retrieve content from servers.
- Timer: I still need to verify this works as expected on the iPhone, but I have a demo page to verify it ready.
In addition to the front end work (of which there will be much, much more), I needed a back-end that I could develop actively. My platform choices were limited in that it needs to work on a Dreamhost shared server, work on my desktop at home, and also on my laptop for the bus or coding around the house. Tomcat had to be discarded: I’d need to set up a separate Tomcat server and Java environment at Dreamhost. Perl was discarded as I really don’t appreciate the language. 
I strongly considered PHP but decided against it in the end. Ruby was also considered but I didn’t want to learn a new language while coding a new app. I toyed with using Lua. In the end, I decided on Python 2.4 so I don’t have to do any gymnastics at Dreamhost. As far as my scripts are concerned, it’s a one-line change between platforms:
#!/Python24/pythonw for Win32
#!/usr/bin/python for Linux
I have a working Python back-end that gives me a minimum of helper objects for working with HTTP requests in a CGI environment. (No WSGI here, at least not yet.) I have room to plug in different request interpreters and a complete world engine or whatever might strike my fancy as long as I keep this minimal interface in place.
Now, nobody said I had to produce anything pretty when proving this works…
Try out my first proof of concept
I’d like my next proof of concept to be an interactive “game” or other social, multi-user activity.