Google Wave

Google Wave is an in-browser JavaScript application which combines the functionality of email, instant messaging (chat rooms) and wiki into a single cohesive interface. This technology is very likely to become fundamental to the Internet because all of the actual concepts behind the JavaScript interface have been developed as an open Internet standard so there is no limitation to its use. Eventually we'd like our whole organisational system to be able to be specified within the context of Internet Protocols as this is an even more open form of technology than the GPL license used by the Open Source community.

What the proposed Wave application will look like as rendered within a web browser

The standard is called Google Wave Federation Protocol and is an extension of the already existing and very popular XMPP protocol (Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol). XMPP is a technology independent standard which includes a protocol called XEP designed to allow any aspect of XMPP to be extended or altered. The XMPP core handles near-real-time, extensible instant messaging (IM) and presence information (e.g., buddy lists), but through its many extensions has expanded into the broader realm of message oriented middleware. Other extensions include VOIP, video conferencing, file transfer streams and forms.

The Wave extension adds the concept of revision-based document storage and collaborative access to the XMPP protocol suite. This is very important because it is essentially all the concepts that make up a wiki and all our forms of communications all unified and encapsulated into an open standard independent of any particular platform or technology.

See also

• http://pyofwave.info/ - python implementation project that is still alive
• XMPP - our XMPP article
• MW:Extension:GoogleWave - some people are quick off the mark!
• Google Wave home
• Google Wave Federation Protocol - the site dedicated to the open protocol
• Google Wave Developer Preview at Google I/O 2009 on YouTube
• Google Wave Guide
• Endesha on Google Wave
• Google Wave: What Might Email Look Like If It Were Invented Today? - by Tim O'Reilly
• The Top 6 Game-Changing Features of Google Wave
• First impressions of Google Wave - on ZDNet
• RWW - Wave Is Dead - NOT!
  • Wave in a Box
  • Apache Wave | Apache Wave incubation project
• RWW - Why Developers Did Not Adopt Google Wave
• Awakening Decentralised Real-time Collaboration - Wave could be back from the dead - opener, distributeder, better!