The significance of the effort is that WebAPI could become a way for smartphone developers to write one application that would run anywhere, including on Apple's iOS, Windows Mobile and Android devices, at least according to .
The WebAPI project, described as , would be a set of HTML5 Application Programming Interfaces (API) that would provide web-based application interfaces accessible by any HTML5 or tablet.
Richard Tibbett, a platform architect for Opera Software, related to the WebAPI project. The document addresses the messaging technology needed for the process to function.
Tibbett suggested in a message to other developers that his concept for WebAPI would allow "any native app, OS or website to offer its own API...We allow free-market forces to naturally select the best APIs offered for any given problem as they spring up."
"What comes to be most used...is up to the market to decide: millions of Web apps deciding which API's to plug in to...The model works in the interests of a constantly evolving Web," he writes.