The Ten-Percent Solution
By Michael Floyd
When you think about it, the Web is an amazing space--a collection of incredible diversity, creativity, and artistry that's all hyperlinked. Even more amazing is the plethora of tools used to create this collaborative work; in fact, my first count came up with 463 unique software tools for creating some aspect of a Web site.
So, when publisher Manny Sawit suggested that Web Techniques confer awards on outstanding tools, I was reluctant. There are so many awards already--for excellence, lifetime achievement, and so on. "The world," I thought, "doesn't need another award." But, to be fair, no one has yet honored the tools Web developers use to create those amazing sites.
However, there are so many tools, that it could take several years of work just to create a taxonomy of Web tools, compile a complete list of all known tools, and categorize them, let alone evaluate them. And that's when the power of the Web hit home. The Web grows at such a phenomenal rate because it is a collaborative effort. We could manage the enormity of the tool-evaluation project using a similar divide-and-conquer approach.
Early this year, I began compiling two lists: The first was a list of known Web-development tools; the second, a list of experts. Our experts come primarily from the ranks of Web Techniques' contributing editors and writers--Lincoln Stein, Lynda Weinman, and former Dr. Dobb's Journal editor Ray Valdes--but also include other notables like Web Review publisher Dale Dougherty and author Richard Koman.
