In a somewhat surprising about-face last week, Apple eased restrictions on building iPhone and iPad applications, allowing developers to use third-party tools such as Adobe Systems' Flash software.

Though it was only a partial capitulation – the ban on third-party tools is gone, but not the prohibition on apps downloading code, so iPhones/iPads still can't access Flash-based web content – it could help ease enterprise concerns about the relative openness of the iOS platform, particularly compared to Google's Android OS that's steamrolling the smartphone market. 

Adobe's aim is to ease cross-platform development of mobile applications with its announcement of a mobile version of its Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) along with Flash Player 10.1 at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week, though whether it will provide clarity or confusion as the smartphone platform wars heat up remains to be seen.

Adobe's new AIR 2 environment is intended to provide the same cross-platform development capabilities outside of a Web browser that its Flash environment provides for Web-based apps. Apps kike TweetDeck and the New York Times Reader where developed as AIR applications to work across a variety of operating systems and browsers.

A few years ago, rich internet apps making use of asynchronous JavaScript and XML—known as Ajax—or Adobe Flash, Adobe Flex/AIR, Java/JavaFX, and the markup language Curl, had an early run to great fanfare—as writings and trade show presentations of the time underscored. Part of the push had to do with enhancing websites to meet rising consumer expectations. Part of it had to do with sheer utility. If the app in question was practical in nature, easier to work with. (With less scrolling, and simpler navigation.)

As social web was emerging, web for commerce had to keep pace.

At the same time, business users behind the firewall needed apps that could somehow be built affordably, yet pack a punch in terms of capability. Forrester, for instance, wrote a report late in 2007 regarding the use of rich apps in “information workplaces.” The paper featured RIA enterprise vendors such as Nexaweb and OpenLaszio.

So, whether it was customer facing or not—it was all about taking individual websites from static bill boards to multimedia experiences.

Much of the buzz was at its height just before the recession hit. With the “hunker down and wait” mentality largely in evidence since then at many workplaces, I’m wondering what applications, if any, you’re retooling now and if web based technology is the way you're going.