Web functions idea

[Larry Bates]

The client software can be written in JavaScript that makes
xmlrpc calls to the server (AJAX).  That way there is no
installation required.

But there are loads of free, debugged mailing list programs
out there that use email as the interface.  You should take
a look there first.

-Larry Bates

Mark Carter wrote:
> I was musing recently about how one could, for example, set up a really
> simple mailing subscription list. It occurred to me that a really simple
> way to implement it would be to use xmlrpc.
> So there could be a function
> subscribe(emailAddress),
> which would send an email for confirmation, and another function
> confirm(emailAddress, password)
> which would confirm the address ... and so on.
> 
> Now, the problem is that, if you use xmlrpc, it requires some kind of
> fiddly software that the client would have to install. What you would
> really want is some kind of web interface instead of xmlrpc - a kind of
> "web driven xmlrpc" (that would eliminate the need of an actual xmlrpc
> server).
> 
> The point of it being this: a developer would just write the functions
> that he needed, a la xmlrpc, which would be "exposed" to this new module
> (let's call it webrpc) - and webrpc would examine the function, work out
> how many arguments it had, and display a form for the user to fill out.
> From an application writer's point-of-view, it abstracts away the whole
> web process, leaving him free to just concentrate on the underlying
> function implementation.