Laszlo should become the IDE for widgets...

Laszlo is open, free, and creates either DHTML or Flash. It's perfect for becomming the standard for widgets... But - why are folks still forking over cash for the Flash IDE as well as rolling their own DHTML, or worse yet hand coding some Flash or HTML?

Because there's no great drag and drop widget builder that outputs to Laszlo - or to anything for that matter. I predict the site that creates a really easy to use drag and drop widget builder that you can run on either your desktop or embed in a page will dominate this space.

C'mon Laszlo! Instead of trying to remake traditional apps in flash, embrace the new widgetyness of the web and come up with a killer IDE for widgets. I have been working on several widget style things in DHTML and it's kinda a pain. What I wouldnt give for something I could use to create a cool widget that runs in the browser, on the desktop, as a konfabulator widget, or whatever. They got soooo close when they started creating blogbox widgets - but had a hard time finding users. Now with sites like The Springbox and WidgetBox popping up now is the time for some open technology to jump in and take a leadership role.


What will this IDE look like? It'll run in the browser, it'll be networked, social, extensible, drag and drop, javascriptable, mashable, consumes other open apis, and free...

Laszlo could be that IDE, but the playing field is wide open. There's nothing preventing Adobe or Microsoft or anyone from creating WidgetBuilder 1.0 that exports to all the various flavors of widget/dhtml. I wonder who will build this?