Distributed User Interface Orchestration: On the Composition of Multi-User (Search) Applications

While mashups may integrate into a new web application data, application logic, and user interfaces sourced from the Web – a highly intricate and complex task – they typically come in the form of simple applications (e.g., composed of only one web page) for individual users. In this chapter, we introduce the idea of distributed user interface orchestration, a mashup-like development paradigm that, in addition to the above features, also provides support for the coordination of multiple users inside one shared application or process. We describe the concepts and models underlying the approach and introduce the MarcoFlow system, a platform for the assisted development of distributed user interface orchestrations. As a concrete development example, we show how the system can be profitably used for the development of an advanced, collaborative search application.