4. Web Pages That Look Like They Should

Webkit is the open source technology underlying the Safari Web browser. It came from the KDE desktop used in Linux, although Apple did a lot of adaptation work.

Webkit was first used in Mac OS X, but it's on the iPhone it really proved its mettle. We forget that before the iPhone, Web browsing on cell phones was dreadful. No real attempt was made to render pages as the designers intended them to appear. Instead, phone browsers usually tried to adapt them.

Webkit could be made small and flexible--perfect for the limited memory of mobile phones--and it allowed Web pages to be viewed as they appear on desktop computers, more or less. The comparatively large screen sizes of iPhones helped, of course.

Webkit spread to other mobile phones. It's at the heart of Google's Android Web browser. Nokia uses it on its phones too, as do Palm and BlackBerry. It's all because of Apple and, perhaps more importantly, the open source spirit of sharing.