IP: Netscape's XML App -- or what is really What's Related

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

Date: Sat, 24 Oct 1998 15:23:37 GMT
From: dwiner () well com (DaveNet email)
Subject: Netscape's XML App

-------------------------------------
> From Scripting News... It's DaveNet! 
Released on 10/24/98; 8:23:30 AM PST
-------------------------------------

  Yesterday I got an email from Jeff Veen at Wired pointing me to the 
  server that Netscape is running its What's Related? application on. 
  This server is part of the project they did with Alexa Internet, and 
  it's the back-end for the What's Related? feature in Netscape 4.5. 
  
  I had a little time to kill, was looking for a diversion, so I sent a 
  message to Netscape's server via script and I was blown away. It's 
  XML! Yes it is. And why, oh why, didn't they tell anyone? (Or did I miss 
  something?) 
  
  Anyway, I wrote an app that talks to their server. It interfaces thru 
  an HTML form. You enter the URL of a site, and I find out what's related, 
  with a twist. The URL to the related site links back to the form, and I do 
  a lookup on *that* site, allowing you to interactively walk their 
  tree of relationships. 
  
  This is just a demonstration. I want to be sure that people interested 
  in building XML apps have a way to experience the XMLness of what 
  Netscape has done, which is very interesting, for sure. 
  
  Here's the link to my app: 
  
  <http://nirvana.userland.com/whatsRelated/> 
  
  Hope you like it! 
  
  ***Absence makes the heart do what? 
  
  Oh baby, so sorry to be gone for so long. 
  
  Sometimes the most important thing is being heard. 
  
  And sometimes it's most important to say nothing. 
  
  For the last four weeks I haven't had much to say. I've been busy and 
  quiet and more productive than I can remember ever being. What am I 
  doing? Building cool servers and editors, of course! 
  
  Stay tuned... 
  
  Dave Winer 

-------------------------------------------
Scripting news: <http://www.scripting.com/>