The Cloud Revolution - From Desktop Software

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

In the early 90′s command line systems almost fully gave way to what we know as graphical user interfaces (GUIs). This transition opened computing up to a whole new range of users. It made computers accessible to the masses. It was at this time that Microsoft Windows became the dominant platform for the distribution of software.

Today we are seeing another seismic shift in the way software is distributed. With this week’s announcement of the new ChromeOS, Google has effectively sped up the transition of software to the Cloud. By making the browser, in effect, the operating system, web applications, like LucidChart, can be just as and in many cases more powerful than their desktop counterparts.

Not All Web Apps Are Created Equal

Within the category of web apps there are two distinctions, those whose foundation are based on a third party platform and those whose foundation are the standards that each browser come with. While at first glance, the differences may not be that apparent, it’s when documents get more complex and collaboration enters that you see the stark differences in terms of speed, responsiveness, stability and overall performance.

LucidChart, unlike it’s desktop and online competitors is built using web standards like HTML5 and JavaScript. Because of this fundamental decision early on, LucidChart has the capacity to handle much more complex documents with greater ease.

Head Up in the Clouds

One Google employee, who will go unnamed, touted that he shows off the speed of LucidChart compared to its desktop counterpart to demonstrate one of the advantages of distributing software in the Cloud. This employee starts Microsoft Visio and LucidChart at the same time to demonstrate how much faster it is to get started with LucidChart. Add in time to purchase, download, and install Visio, and you’re looking at even a more significant amount of time invested.

We at Lucid are placing our bet that eventually all the various types of software that has traditionally been downloaded to the computer will one day be hosted in the cloud. As browser technologies continue to improve (the latest version of Chrome is over 100 times faster than dominant browser from a little over two years ago), web standards broadly adopted, and internet connectivity expanded, software distributed in the cloud will become the de facto standard. We think we’re on the right platform. The truly universal platform, the world wide web.

About the author

Dav Gra is interested in the latest trends of search engine optimization and marketing. He is a fan of collaborative solutions for distributed teams, including an online wireframe software and mind mapping software.

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