Will the Next Web Platform Please Hold Still?

Esther Schindler writes: "Feeling a little overwhelmed by changing web standards and new browser choices? You aren't the only one. Mozilla is launching development tracks for the next two editions of its Firefox Web browser — versions 5 and 6 — immediately, with hopes to push both into general release before the end of the year. This while Microsoft previews Internet Explorer 10 on the heels of its IE9 release, and Google projects Chrome 13 just one year after Chrome 7. Meanwhile, HTML5, the next version of the Web’s primary language, appears to have entered a permanent gestation phase. Writes Scott Fulton: All the confusion has prompted Web developers to ask this question: What do we develop our sites against now?

Fulton doesn't just write a general rant: He gets input from several of the people who are creating browsers and standards. And they don't just spout a company line. My favorite quote is from Bruce Lawson, a Web evangelist for Opera Software as well as a long-time contributor to the Accessibility Task Force of the Web Standards Project: “You wouldn’t believe how many e-mails I get saying, ‘Bruce, would you give me some feedback on my HTML5 page,’ and I look at it, and it’s no more HTML5 than my vacuum cleaner. Because it looks snazzy and it’s got a rounded corner and a drop-shadow, people are calling it HTML5.”"