What is Web 2.0?

Web 2.0 is a concept phrase coined by O’Reilly Media that refers to a new generation of Internet based services that involve enhanced online collaboration among users.

Web 2.0 provides a new and enhanced makeover for the World Wide Web by providing users with an easier and a faster web. Web 2.0 makes use of the desktop applications at a greater level than the traditional version with static web pages. It makes use of a number of techniques that includes web syndication, AJAX, and public web service APIs. In web syndication, a part of the website is made available to be used by other sites. AJAX is used to create interactive web applications.

Web 2.0 also supports mass publishing like wikis and blogs. Wiki refers to a site that facilitates easy addition, removal and editing of the contents of a site, with or without registration. Blogs are publications of periodic articles on the web. Web 2.0 is often used to describe anything that is new and popular on the World Wide Web.

Technology Infrastructure of Web 2.0

Web 2.0 has a developing and complex technology infrastructure. The technology includes the use of content syndication, server software, standards-based browsers that have extensions and plugins, client applications, and messaging protocols. All these advanced technology provides Web 2.0 with dissemination, creation, and information storage capability. There are a number of major techniques that Web 2.0 website uses. Some of them include:

• Rich Internet Application techniques that are unobtrusive like AJAX. The Rich Internet Applications are the web applications having the traditional desktop applications functionality and features.
• CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) are used to describe the presentations of documents that are documented in a markup language. CSS describes them in a stylesheet language.
• Semantically valid XHTML markup and the application of Microformats. The Microformats are the markups that permit expression of semantics in an HTML web page.
• Proper aggregation and syndication of data in RSS/Atom. RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is mainly used by the news websites and weblogs for web syndication in XML.
• Significant and clean URLs.
• Publishing Weblogs. Weblogs are the web-based periodic publication of articles.
• Mashup, which is a web application or a site that merges content from various sources into an integral knowledge.
• REST or XML Webservice APIs. Representation State Transfer (REST) is a software architectural approach for dispersed hypermedia systems similar to the World Wide Web.

Most of the Web 2.0 websites attach great importance to the visual appeal and aesthetics of the site. To achieve such an effect, they make use of drop shadows, rounded corners, and gradients to make the site more appealing to the eyes.

You might also like to Read:

1. Mashups – the Web 2.0 way for Hybrid Apps
2. Rich Internet Applications (RIA)
3. Web 3.0
4. Flight Tracking using Mashup Apps and RIA
5. Windows Azure Platform Services