Greatest Web Software Ever Written
August 21st, 2007 | by Neal Levene |
Back in the May 2007 issue of Information Week, Charles Babcock wrote an article about what he considerd the Greatest Web Software Ever Written. It is an interesting article. He felt the following was the most impactful Web software.
- Mosaic - Mosaic was the first popular World Wide Web browser and Gopher client. It was reliable and easy to install, which opened the Web up to the general public. Mosaic was the first browser to actually implement images embedded in the text, rather than displayed in a separate window.
- AltaVista - Delivered the Internet’s first Web index in 1995. It was the first multilingual search capabilities on the Internet. It also was the first Internet search engine to launch Image, Audio, and Video search capabilities.
- Craigslist - Started in 1995, hosts local community classifieds and forums - a place to find jobs, housing, goods & services, social activities, a girlfriend or boyfriend, advice, community information, and just about anything else — all for free, and in a relatively non-commercial environment.
- The Well - The Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link (or The WELL) is one of the oldest virtual communities in continuous operation. It currently has about 4,000 members. It is best known for its Internet forums, but also provides email, shell accounts, and web pages. The discussion and topics on the WELL range from the deeply serious to the generally silly, depending on the nature and interests of the participants.
- eBay - Online auction site.
- Amazon.com - Online retailer - originally books.
- XMLHttpRequest object set - The XMLHttpRequest object is an interface exposed by a scripting engine that allows scripts to perform HTTP client functionality, such as submitting form data or loading data from a remove Web site.
- Wikipedia - Wikipedia is a multilingual, web-based, free content encyclopedia project. It has been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world and the vast majority of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the Internet.
- World of Warcraft - World of Warcraft is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). In World of Warcraft, thousands of players adventure together in an enormous, persistent game world, forming friendships, slaying monsters, and engaging in epic quests that can span days or weeks.
- Hotmail - Hotmail was one of the original and most popular free e-mail (webmail) service, provided by MSN (Microsoft), which is accessible from a Web browser anywhere in the world.
- Digg - Digg is a collaborative location where people can discover and share content from anywhere on the web.
- AOL Instant Messenger - AIM is a free online service that lets you communicate (chat) in real time over the Internet.
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