There's been a bit of speculation about BrowserPlus, the mysterious new platform from Yahoo!. Today we remove that veil of mystery to show you directly what it is, what it does, and why we can't wait to hear what you think.

BrowserPlus is a platform for extending the Web: an end-user installs it and a developer uses its features through a small JavaScript library. Some of the features that exist in the platform today include:

Drag-and-drop from the desktop
Client-side image manipulation (cropping, rotation & filters)
Desktop notifications

The most unique attribute of BrowserPlus is its ability to update and add new services on the fly without a browser restart or even reloading the page! For users, this means no more interruptions or installers to run. We handle the complexity of software distribution and updates. For developers, it means you can check for and activate new services with a single function call (pending user approval, of course).

Yahoo BrowserPlus Gets Ready For Developers [developer.yahoo.net]

[browserplus.yahoo.com...]