Restrictions to this model were many. A second approach was to build small applications as plug-ins to the Web browser. While successful in the Intranet, they were not easily accepted in the Internet. Here again, use of general Internet application concepts and extending them for mapping purposes is a straightforward solution. A modular software design can use well-established components.
Geographic extensions concentrate on user interaction and map generation issues.
If connected to a universal geographic database server, dynamic mapping solutions can be realized in a fraction of the time needed for the adaptation of existing stand-alone GIS software. Application Services GIS offers a large set of analysis and modeling functions. For high performance tuning they are usually tightly linked to their own data management. Furthermore, they need strong workstations for acceptably fast treatment. With the Web browser paradigm spreading more and more, specialized GIS applications are pushed into a niche, unless they migrate to the server.