The Smart Client Opportunity
Over the past few years, IT organizations have chosen between two primary
application development and deployment architectures: "Thin client"
browser-based applications: Easy to deploy and manage centrally but provide a
limited user experience "Fat client" architectures: Provide a more productive
and responsive user experience and run both online and offline but are
difficult and expensive to deploy and update on the desktop However, with the
advent of the .NET Framework, there is now a new alternative called "smart
clients". Smart client applications provide value for a wide variety of
applications by bridging the gap between "fat" and "thin" clients. Smart
client applications (as defined by Microsoft) have the following
characteristics: Run locally on the desktop using local resources,
applications, and peripheral devices Can be used o... (more)