"The challenge is going to be whether the widgets are going to be easy to test, easy to deploy," he said, noting that developers do not want code that is scattered and hard to maintain.

Bloomberg said that Icesoft, with its Icefaces product, offers AJAX functionality that does not require the use of JavaScript.

The "j" in jMaki stands for Java, while Maki is a Japanese word for wrap that is commonly used to describe a type of sushi. jMaki refers to a JavaScript Wrapper Framework.

Sun also launched two developer Web portals, developers.sun.com/ajax and java.sun.com/javascript. The first features resources for getting started with AJAX applications, including technical articles, code samples, development tools, and runtime solutions. The second offers information on using JavaScript and Java effectively.