Ash Patel, chief product officer for Yahoo Inc. has announced his company is releasing four new Web services APIs, with a distinct AJAX flavor. The announcement was made at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference in San Diego. Yahoo! Simultaneously released a press release with detailed information of the APIs.

These APIs are intended to enable developers to use and build upon technology from Yahoo Photos, Calendar, MyWeb and Shopping, creating a participatory environment that increases the relevance of Yahoo products and services for individual users and the greater community.

"Developers play an important role in helping to enhance Yahoo!'s vast network of services," said Ash Patel.  "These new APIs along with new tools available on the Developer Network will continue to foster an environment of creativity and innovation that ultimately benefits Yahoo!'s users."

During his presentation, Patel said that in when in 2004, Yahoo acquired Oddpost Inc., a group of developers were working on using JavaScript and XML to get a desktop look and feel for Web-based applications. The recently released Yahoo! Mail beta, according to him, is a culmination of Oddpost pre-AJAX work. "We had a group inside Yahoo! working on AJAX applications for years before they were called AJAX," said Patel.

Yahoo is planning to make the following AJAX-inclined APIs available on the Developer Network:

• Yahoo Photos API: In the coming months, a new Yahoo Photos API to allow developers to build custom applications on top of the world's largest photo sharing service. By opening up its API, Yahoo Photos encourages the developer community and photo product providers to create value-added features and products for Yahoo Photos' 34 million users worldwide
  
• Yahoo Shopping APIs: Based on developer feedback, Yahoo! Shopping has enhanced its APIs with a new browse navigation feature that helps consumers quickly narrow their product search by providing the user with a menu of sub-categories and product attributes to further refine their search results. A browse shopping experience with category and attribute based refinement can also be built, allowing users to drill down and obtain product results meeting their preferred product criteria.
  
• Yahoo Calendar API: The Yahoo Calendar API is intended to enable developers to write applications that make it easier for users to access their Yahoo Calendar from other sites on the Web, enhancing the experience for millions of Yahoo Calendar users. Yahoo plans to make this new API available in the coming months.
  
• MyWeb 2.0 API: This enhanced API provides the ability to read from as well as write to MyWeb 2.0 and is intended to enable information to move seamlessly between MyWeb and other applications or devices. Yahoo plans to make this new MyWeb 2.0 API available in the coming months.