This week saw the final release of Adobe® AIR™, and it felt like the right moment to talk about this new technology that seems to be here to stay.

AIR™ (codename Apollo™) is a cross-platform runtime that allows the development of desktop applications using web technologies such as Flash®, Flex®, HTML, and Javascript.

Its rendering engine is WebKit — originally born as a fork of KHTML (the engine behind the Konqueror browser) for the development of Apple Safari, and now a benchmark in the browser world (alongside Presto). Beyond AIR™ and Safari, WebKit is also present in Nokia’s S60 phones and in Google’s eagerly awaited Android, which we covered a while back.

With AIR it’s possible to build desktop applications that are independent of both browser and operating system, using no more effort than developing any traditional web application — because you’re using exactly the same tools and technologies.

It’s easy to grasp what this means:

• From a web developer’s perspective, the doors have just been flung open to a whole new world that was previously off-limits: the desktop.
• From a user’s perspective, they’ll find an unprecedented range of applications on offer. Countless games, small utilities, and web services will land directly on their desktop.
• From the perspective of a brand or internet company, this represents a new opportunity for marketing campaigns and extending web services.

For example, imagine I’m a mobile phone brand that wants to showcase its revolutionary new device. Until now, to promote it online, I would have had to create a micro-site (or a space on the brand’s main site) where users could view images, videos, technical specs, perhaps a 360° view, or even a demo of the device’s interface.

But wouldn’t it be great if — additionally or alternatively — the user could download a virtual version of the phone to their desktop? Rotate it, open it, close it, power it on and off, try out its interface, and view all the other information directly on their screen… (all without being confined to a window like a conventional application — “virtual version” is meant literally).

AIR makes this possible, and best of all, developing it would be practically identical to building any website in terms of time, effort, and budget. And for the same price, you don’t need to build a separate version for Windows XP, Vista, Mac, Linux, and so on.

In the next instalment we’ll look at the Mozilla Foundation’s alternative, Prism, and we’ll close with Silverlight, Microsoft’s entry into the race. Stay tuned!