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Building Richly Interactive Web Apps with Ajax 358

Posted by timothy from the you-were-there dept.
FalsePositives writes "Ajax: A New Approach to Web Applications (from Adaptive Path and via Jeffery Veen) introduces their experiences with what they are calling 'Ajax' as in 'Asynchronous JavaScript + XML' aka the XmlHttpRequest Object. It is used by Google (Google Maps, Google Suggest, Gmail), in Amazon's A9, and a few others (like the map of Switzerland spotted by Simon Willison). ... Is this 'The rise of the Weblication'?"
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Building Richly Interactive Web Apps with Ajax More

Building Richly Interactive Web Apps with Ajax

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  • Weblication? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Neil Blender ( 555885 ) <neilblender@gmail.com> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:24PM (#11758174)
    No more cutesy terms, please.

  • Compatibility? (Score:5, Funny)

    by nizo ( 81281 ) * on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:24PM (#11758178) Homepage Journal
    Is Ajax compatible with the Odysseus web security tool [wastelands.gen.nz] or will it just cause Ajax to die a horrible death?

  • new acronym (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:26PM (#11758200)

    old technology, noob developers

    remote scripting has been around since 1998 with Dan Steinmans DynAPI, then Brent Ashley published his remote scripting and a plethora of remote scripting projects popped up on sourceforge

    the only thing new here are the developers/kids calling it Ajax when its nothing new or original at all, not to mention MS has had remote data binding on elemnts since IE4 !

    sheesh

    • Wow (Score:5, Funny)

      by aristus ( 779174 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:34PM (#11758297)
      an "oldskool" web developer grumbling about newskool kids who don't know what it was like back in the Real Days. Why, all we had were radio buttons! And they could only tune in AM! And we liked it that way!
      • And we pushed the data up hill both ways through those network cables!

        And we didn't have any of this here fancy eethernet! We used Tokenized Rings! Now that was networking! And Arked-Nets!

        Young kids today have no appreciation for all the hard work we did back in MY day! (humph!)

      • Re:Wow (Score:5, Funny)

        by theshowmecanuck ( 703852 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @05:20PM (#11759426) Journal
        Old Developer: ...and we could only use ones and zero's!
        Dilbert: You had ones? We had to use lower case L's.
    • Remote scripting has been around since before 1997, when I wrote an app that used a frame to fetch data (in the form of javascript) from the server.
      • It was not an original Idea when I did it. Also, XMLHttpRequest makes it much nicer (can post back XML, etc)
        • XMLHTTP is nice, but using a frame lets you preserve history. Which one you use depends on what you need in your application. There's all kinds of other clever ways to do this as well. I used a combination of techniques five years ago to do this sort of dynamic web app stuff, using an embedded applet to open a TCP connection back. Nice interactivity with very low bandwidth utilization. Nowadays I'd just use keepalive and eat the HTTP overhead. Shame I never could get it "to market", so three years ago
    • Putting a cute name on it may seem trite but it might make more developers aware that this exists and get them interested in using it. I only discovered xmlHttpRequest about 3 years ago, and was blow away by the ability to make a page essentially act like a true client-server app. The idea seemed to go by the wayside when Asp.Net appeared, as it stressed making the client side as dumb as possible and refreshing the page for every damn little thing. Now the MS pendulum seems to have swung back the other way;

    • Re:new acronym (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ReadParse ( 38517 )
      Why am I replying to an Anonymous Coward? Not sure.

      This is not really old technology. Pieces of it are old. What's new is the ability to really do it in the real world, thanks to some pretty decent standards support by all the major browsers, including the XMLHTTP object, which is what makes it possible to send a request dynamically.

      The name Ajax? Well that's just what this guy is calling it, and it's not an altogether bad name. Call it whatever you want, but he's absolutely not wrong that this is a

  • Greeaaaat (Score:3, Funny)

    by Nathonix ( 843449 ) <nathonix@gmail.com> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:26PM (#11758205)
    Even more stuff to learn. As if high school wasnt mind numbing enough.
    • Even more stuff to learn. As if high school wasnt mind numbing enough.

      Are you implying that you actually have to learn stuff at your high school? Damn, I was cheated!

  • Is this the rise of (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    yet an other buzzword?

    Webplication? Please.

  • XUL apps (Score:3, Interesting)

    by OmniVector ( 569062 ) <see my homepage> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:31PM (#11758260) Homepage
    it's a shame we don't have a standard web-app framework yet, because i've seen some pretty cool stuff done with XUL. i keep thinking "man, it would be awesome to have an XUL based webmail client. or an XUL based search engine" .. etc etc. hopefully what-wg will change things, but it's a shame to see all these competing web app libraries now because it really makes universality impossible

  • Caution (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Ajax is not meant to be used on windows.

  • Java app (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dfj225 ( 587560 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:35PM (#11758309) Homepage Journal
    Maybe I'm missing the point somewhere, but if you really want something on the web to feel like an app, why not make it a Java app that runs in the browser? With all the different browsers and how they each handle Javascript differently, I much rather write something in Java and know it will almost always work on different platforms. Anytime I have to do something in Javascript, it almost always feels like a hack. I can't imagine writing something like the stuff Google does in Javascript. Is there really an advantage to doing stuff this way over the Java way?

    • Re:Java app (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MyIS ( 834233 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:43PM (#11758397) Homepage

      First of all, almost any PC will have a semi-recent IE installed (or Firefox for the more enlightened), and that is already enough to run Google's stuff.

      Compare that to the Java plugin requirement, which, sad to say, is pretty far behind in availability on most PCs.

      Also, Javascript-based stuff is easier to program, trust me on this. Layout of elements is much easier - and it can be done in any decent HTML editor. Finally, there's no thread-related insanity that AWT/Swing bring to the table.

    • Re:Java app (Score:5, Insightful)

      by TedTschopp ( 244839 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:43PM (#11758399) Homepage
      I bet someone else will post the exact same thing, but instead they will replace Java with Flash...

      I think the point is that you don't need to insert an object or rely on a 3rd party enviroment. You can do it in Javascript.

      Also, the reason this is so very cool is that it doesn't tie your applicaiton into a backend of any kind, you can scale your backend as long as it spits out XML. I think this is the reason so many of the big companies are going to it. They require a bit more flexibility on that end.
      • you can still have the same flexibility on the back end with java/flash
      • I've got it!

        Flash + Java = Flava!

        And we can get Flava Flav to promote it!

        YES! Bow before the mighty marketing droid!

      • Re:Java app (Score:3, Insightful)

        by slagdogg ( 549983 )
        Ummm, yeah but Javascript in each variation of this or that browser *is* a 3rd party environment in many ways. If I write something like this in Flash, I don't need to worry so much about browser quirks and the like. Plus Flash has a rendering engine designed for apps like this ... something like Google Maps could have been just as "neato" in Flash and would've been much easier to write.

        And Flash has 99% penetration, which is probably better than the numbers for browsers which properly support Google Maps.
    • I agree javaScript is too horrible.
      Every second line has to be a hack to cope with browser differences!

      • Re:Java app (Score:5, Insightful)

        by temojen ( 678985 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:06PM (#11758643) Journal
        function getDataDOM(url){
        data = (!window.XMLHttpRequest)? (new ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLHTTP")):(new XMLHttpRequest());
        data.onreadystatechange = readyStateChangeFunction;
        data.open("GET",url,true);
        data.send(null);
        return data;
        };

        You were saying?

        • You don't even need to use ActiveX objects in IE. You can use document.createElement("xml") and use Internet Explorer's built-in XML islands extention [microsoft.com] to load content, which seems to work even if ActiveX is disabled (at least for me) in IE6-SP2. Pimping my own stuff: I wrote a few journal entries on this topic a while ago. Check out the original article [slashdot.org] and its update [slashdot.org].

      • Re:Java app (Score:4, Insightful)

        by GeckoX ( 259575 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:36PM (#11758964)
        Bullshit Bullshit Bullshit.

        Can I say it again?

        Bullshit Bullshit Bullshit.

        I write these kinds of apps. I have been doing so for years now. I haven't written a browser-fork in code in AGES. I don't even use the hacks in CSS for chrissakes. They aren't needed.

        Remind me never to hire you mmm kay?

    • Re:Java app (Score:3, Interesting)

      by misleb ( 129952 )
      Java GUIs are traditionally slow and ugly. Also there are often problems with Java runtime versions. It is difficult to write a non-trivial Java application that will run on various different version of the Java runtime. Some people are going to have 1.2, some 1.3, some 1.4, etc. Using standard DHTML or even Mozilla's XUL provides a much more elegant application that looks and feels better than most Java GUI's. DHTML and XUL also integrate with the browser better.

      -matthew

    • Re:Java app (Score:5, Informative)

      by Hamfist ( 311248 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:54PM (#11758523)
      Our company is arriving a bit late to the 'intranet' party, and I'm developing our Intranet in this style. Where you really notice the difference is:

      1. Speed - It f'ing fast
      2. Startup time - Instant
      3. Footprint - small
      4. Browser support - surprisingly consistent. Event models need some work, including Firefox.

      Did I mention that it's fast? Check out google suggest, realize that there's a round trip to the server going on in the background, and you'll get the picture.

      It also maintains suprisingly light code. You just register an event handler of some DOM element, and let the teensy bits of javascript pull up some fresh XHTML. This technique fits very well with simple event driven programming.

      Another nice thing is that you can use most whatever as a callback. I'm using good old PHP, as PHP snippets are fast and lightweight.

      I suspect we will be seeing alot much more of this.

      • It becomes close impossible to maintain when you look at it only once every 6 months. I've worked on a couple of these projects.

        Not having a compiled language is a real pain when you do maintance because it is harder to trace throught the code or know when you broke it. (yah, you don't write comprehensive tests either!)

        Joe
        • That sounds like a bad dev process, not exactly the fault of the tech used. Web apps can be thoroughly documented, and comprehensive tests most certainly can be written.
    • Because the elements that comprise Ajax are all included in the typical browser without adding a plug-in. What's more, functionality similar to what XmlHttpRequest provides is currently making its way into the DOM standard.

      If you stick to the standards and forego trying to maintain compatibility with very old browsers, you can write some pretty clean and functional apps with Javascript these days - and you can reasonably expect to run them on a variety of operating systems and platforms without the need fo

      • What's more, functionality similar to what XmlHttpRequest provides is currently making its way into the DOM standard.

        DOM 3 Load and Save [w3.org] was published as a W3C recommendation almost a year ago, and works in Mozilla, Firefox, Konqueror and the latest Opera betas.

    • Re:Java app (Score:2, Insightful)

      by gik ( 256327 )
      I'd' normally agree with you on this one, but you have to ask yourself why Google would do it the Javascript way. Speed. No, this isn't a "Java is slow" troll. I see this Javascript clientside stuff as exciting, because we're using the clientside scripting strengths of the browser, which, even though they differ slightly from browser to browser, offer much in terms of execution speed.

      Also, many people are used to the concept of a "web-application" by now (CSS, tables, fun JS stuff, whatever). Being able to

    • Re:Java app (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Trailer Trash ( 60756 )
      1. Java penetration is nowhere near that of Flash. If you really want to go proprietary, use Flash. Not only does it also allow XML requests to the server, it also has a very nice application creator.

      2. The differences between platforms is way overstated. My apps run in Firefox, Mozilla, and IE for Windows, as well as newer versions of Safari.

      Javascript is included in all browsers. Every platform that matters has an interpreter already. It's a great choice.

  • Too skimpy? (Score:3, Informative)

    by Quixote ( 154172 ) * on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:40PM (#11758366) Homepage Journal
    I RTFA (I know, I should burn my /. membership card), but I got the feeling that the entire article could be summarised in a paragraph or two. There was a lot of handwaving, and not enough nuts-and-bolts stuff. I was looking for simple examples, etc. but other than links to Google's myriad offerings, there wasn't much else.
  • The Fine Article talks about several elements working together to pull off this new stuff. One of the technologies is "dynamic display and interaction using the Document Object Model".

    So if DOM is essential to the "display and interaction" (that is, the user interface), what does that do to non-Windows users? When they browse, do they just get nothing? Or do they get a crippled user interface?

  • Sounds a lot like JPSpan (Score:5, Informative)

    by misleb ( 129952 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:41PM (#11758384)
    Does anyone know how Ajax compares with JPSpan [sourceforge.net]? I've been using JPSpan in a Firefox plugin that I am working on and it is really nice. Basically it takes a PHP class and presents it to your JavaScript as a JavaScript object (after you create an isntance of it). As far as your web application is concerned, the object exists in the local context, but actually, the code is running on a remote server. JPSpan takes care of the XmlRequest stuff for you.

    -matthew

  • Mozilla? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ceswiedler ( 165311 ) * <chris@swiedler.org> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:43PM (#11758392)
    Can Mozilla integrate these apps better? From what I understand there's a lot of JavaScript going on to talk to the server, parse the results, etc. Could some of that be moved into custom reusable libraries in Mozilla / Firefox which the Javascript (Ajax engine) utilizes? I've noticed that Google Maps can take a heck of a lot of processor overhead. I imagine a lot of that is Javascript parsing which could easily be moved into compiled libraries.

    It would be very interesting to have these applications work better (faster, more smoothly) on Mozilla based platforms, and degrade into a portable Javascript-only implementation on other browsers such as IE.
  • one can only hope...

  • Flash for Rich Web Applications (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I don't understand why developers still look at HTML fix ups to make web applications rich. Especially when a tool like Macromedia's Flash allows a developer to build a rich web application with a clean interface that truly mimics a desktop application's. It offers a small foot print, interactivitey, mantains state, and can work with eneterprise backend logic (Web Services, J2EE, ASP.Net, and Coldfusion). Better solution hand down.

    If your interested I wrote a short white paper on why its the future of w
    • we're coders, not artists. (Flex or no Flex)

      And Flash is expensive to buy, IDE wise.

      HTML, Javascript and XML can all be developed on whatever text editor you like.

    • I don't understand why developers still look at HTML fix ups to make web applications rich. Especially when a tool like Macromedia's Flash allows a developer to build a rich web application with a clean interface that truly mimics a desktop application's.

      Let me know when it works on my iBook running Debian (Google Maps behaves perfectly). And I'm sure people running BSDs and proprietary Unixes are equally thrilled by Flash. Clearly Macromedia doesn't care much for cross-platform compatibility, given th

  • Give it a name (Score:3, Interesting)

    by lal ( 29527 ) * on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:47PM (#11758450)

    The cynic in me says that this guy took a good look at Google's innovation and gave it a name:

    At Adaptive Path, we've been doing our own work with Ajax over the last several months, and we're realizing we've only scratched the surface of the rich interaction and responsiveness that Ajax applications can provide.

    In this quote, read "doing our own work" as "invoking view source".

    • The cynic in me says that this guy took a good look at Google's innovation and gave it a name:

      Google's innovation? This technology has been around for years. Google are merely the first high-profile organisation to require it for public web applications. And requiring it is bad, the concept of "graceful degradation" is sadly lost on Google.

  • It's probably just a bias on my part, but if it's related to JavaScript ( that which was once more correctly called LiveScript ), then I'm simply not very interested. What's described is "write an ungodly big JavaScript to pass XML between the server and client". Sounds great... really new, groundbreaking stuff there.

    Thanks anyway. You kids have fun. My browser will ignore your site(s) until I'm literally forced to use them.

    Then, they won't work right unless I use the browser you developed it on... yea, G

    • Re:JavaScript ? I'm out. (Score:5, Funny)

      by cabra771 ( 197990 ) <<cabra771> <at> <yahoo.com>> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:00PM (#11758591) Homepage
      Dude. Seriously. It's 2005. Time to put down the Netscape 4.7 and walk away.
      • Dude. Seriously. I'm using Safari 1.2.4.

        Also, seriously, Javascript sucks eggs, IMHO... like I said, it's probably just a bad, unfounded personal bias I have based solely on historical issues ( security, bug-compatability across implementations, etc ) and just seeing lots of crap scripts, but... I'm not a fan. Most things Javascript are used for are either just annoying, or could be done server-side.

        I'm generally of the opinion that, if what you really want is an active, full-fledged application, you should

    • What's described is "write an ungodly big JavaScript to pass XML between the server and client".

      What? XMLHttpRequest can grab an XML document in a few lines of code. What makes you think you need to "write an ungodly big JavaScript"?

      Then, they won't work right unless I use the browser you developed it on... yea, Google maps, that's great, it works with all the Javascript-supporting browsers out there, right ?

      Feel free to single Google out for screwing up compatibility, but it's a shortcoming

    • "Thanks anyway. You kids have fun. My browser will ignore your site(s) until I'm literally forced to use them."

      I guess you won't be responding again, once I point out that there are three sections of Javascript in this very page.

  • So basically what you're telling me... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by La Camiseta ( 59684 ) <me@nathanclayton.com> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:49PM (#11758478) Homepage Journal
    Isn't he describing something like the Echo Framework [nextapp.com]?

    Hey look, a web framework that uses javascript to dynamically update itself! It's only been around at that website since 2002.

  • That dull roar that you hear... (Score:3, Funny)

    by nobodyman ( 90587 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:53PM (#11758514) Homepage
    ...is the sound of thousands of recruiters feverishly updating their Monster.com job postings:
    5+ Years Ajax Development REQUIRED
    Now my resume is going to spill over to three pages, unless I remove "15 years LAMP development". Damn.

  • Will this worry M$? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by linuxwrangler ( 582055 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:53PM (#11758520)
    Not only do Google mail, Google maps and several of the other examples feature pretty impressive interactive user interfaces, they also work just fine on FireFox. And on Linux. And the servers aren't tied to any particular OS either.

    The ability to deploy full featured apps hosted on AnyServer(tm) and usable on AnyBrowser(tm) can't make Microsoft very happy.
  • There should be a project that unifies these things together and allows programmers to code with a single language/tool and handle the browser differences, etc. Perhaps there already is? This would be very powerful, perhaps it can be approached as a XUL to Javascript 'compiler' of sorts
  • This article describes an architectural concept NOT an actual technology. AJAX, is similar to Client-Server in that it implies a mode of development for a given network topology and NOT an actual toolset. The richer interaction of remote scripting techniques will provide a significant challenge to XFORMS as it will be unable to compete with the functionality. XFORMS is what web driven apps should have been in '97, the new class of techniques using Javascript,CSS,xmlhttprequest and other DHTML tools are the
  • What will they search now? I can't see many sites, especially shopping sites, powering their interfaces this way. Suddenly they'd lose all their search engine hits and PageRank becomes that much less useful. Sure it's good for the likes of email sites and interactive maps, where the data wouldn't be indexed much anyway.

  • web content developer toting new web design? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by iamhassi ( 659463 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @03:59PM (#11758569) Journal
    " "Ajax: A New Approach to Web Applications" (from Adaptive Path..."

    Adaptive Path Services: "We evaluate your site and offer detailed recommendations." [adaptivepath.com]

    wait wait, this is rich, let me get this straight: a web design company wrote a article saying what you're using now is the "old" sucky way and their new stuff is the way to go??

    hold on! this is revolutionary! ;)

    Not that AJAX isn't great, i'm sure it is, but this is like reading a article on how great a new car is that was written by the manufacture. Perhaps a more unbiased article needs to be submitted before I believe it.

    oh and mod me +5 flamebait cuz i have so much karma i'm sniffing clouds.

  • On Monster.com or what-have-you...

    Web developper needed, must have 5 years experience with AJAX

    I love HR departments...

  • What has been taken for granted in every client/server application (that the client and server can, well, you know *communicate*) can now be done in a HTML application. ...and there was much rejoicing.

    It's a hack based upon unstandard JavaScript extensions, and even when it works, it still sucks for building applications.

    However, even though unstandard it is supported by most browsers, and it sucks very much less the alternatives.

    If you are forced to develop web "applications" this is probably a very goo

  • I don't know about you, but I'd love to have some sample source available to understand better what they're doing and how it all fits together.
  • So, the real question is this: I'm about 10% into coding a major open source project that I've been spec'ing out for a long time. I'm at a point where I could switch to AJAX to handle things (and don't think it's not *super* tempting), but it's a bit daunting of a task.

    Should I do that? Or should I stick to using CSS/HTML + PHP and regular server-side coding, and then move to AJAX in version 2.0?

    I love GMAIL, and the benefits of saving bandwidth and increasing the speed seem really enticing. As far as
    • Stick to what you have.
      Implement this feature only when you have a problem with php->xhtml+css.

      Also, there are things that break in the browser, like the back button, etc.

      Also, it's harder to make changes to the interface unless you really modularize well, but that takes effort to implement.

      Furthermore, recall that lynx and search engines don't use javascript.

  • Interesting enough, but I want to see more. (Score:3)

    by Badgerman ( 19207 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:06PM (#11758642)
    Overall, I find this interesting despite some questions (interoperability, etc.). It looks convenient, it looks planned, and I've done hidden-frames work rather effectively.

    The article just doesn't SAY much. I want more links, more code, more examples. Yes, it looks pretty, but don't just show me the product, let me under the hood, let me test drive it.

    That being said, I'd also like to know if this framework can integrate into others. If you could merge this into Mono, into STRUTS, etc. . . . then we've got something REALLY interesting.

  • Outperforming Desktop apps (Score:5, Interesting)

    by davetrainer ( 587868 ) <slashdot.davetrainer@com> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:07PM (#11758663)

    Here is an article [infoworld.com] by John Udell that I found fascinating when it was published a few months ago. It discusses the quasi-rich-client architecture that Google cobbled together to bring us GMail. The really incredible part is that interfaces built on this architecture, consumed in the browser, outperform commercial desktop apps:

    "One of my favorite acid tests is address completion. When you begin typing an e-mail address, your mail program should immediately show you the matching addresses and then dynamically constrain the list as you continue to type. Outlook does poorly on this test; you have to type CTRL-K to invoke the address book in a separate window. OS X's Mail does address completion in situ, just as I expect. So does Gmail. And here's the shocker: Gmail does it faster."

    I appreciate AP's efforts to assign some greater precision and clarity to this architecture. Up until now, realistically, I figured I had to be tethered to .net/XAML, Mozilla/XUL, or something like Macromedia Flex.

  • Thats funny, I've been considering moving toward SVG 2.0 ... which provides lots of nice GUI features, PLUS javascript, and native sockets support. (Well in the standard anyway)

  • Some slashdotters have already identified this technique of using a combination of using javascript, xml, and dhtml has been around for some time (the article even says its mature). It has been refferred to in the past as javascript remoting or dhtml depending on what your talking about. I work for a company with a web database app that uses a similar technique. Our product, Sysbotz Enterprise [sysbotz.com] has been in development about a year now which show you the age here.

    I think the big deal here is not some much th

  • bad photos (Score:5, Interesting)

    by clmensch ( 92222 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:30PM (#11758887) Homepage Journal
    Why do tech writers feel the narcissistic need to display photos of themselves next to their writings? That is probably the largest photo I've ever seen on one of these articles...and it's an awful photo at that. They obviously cut the baldness of his head off for a reason, and half the photo is of his black on black outfit.

    Their whole site reeks of late 90's marketspeak. Slightly interesting article, though.
    • They obviously cut the baldness of his head off for a reason, and half the photo is of his black on black outfit.

      So you noticed how they cropped the frame too close? That's cool. So is black on black. This guy is cool. That's the point.

      If he had a darker complexion, dreds, and thick black-frame glasses he'd be even cooler. Especially if he was using a Powerbook in a park. But there's only so much you can do with a bald white guy.

  • Cool? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by IPFreely ( 47576 ) <mark@mwiley.org> on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:34PM (#11758946) Homepage Journal
    If anything about current interaction design can be called "glamorous," it's creating Web applications. After all, when was the last time you heard someone rave about the interaction design of a product that wasn't on the Web? (Okay, besides the iPod.) All the cool, innovative new projects are online.

    Cool?

    Developing applications using a particular technology because it's cool? Un-f*****g-believable. If you can get something on the web to interact almost as well as a client application it should be considered a miracle of design. The only advantage I see on web apps is that you don't have to install anything on the client PC, and even that's a stretch if you consider the apps that require flash, MSXML or all the different media players.
    It's like calling lemmings cool because they invented base jumping.

    PS: Yes, I have developed web apps with popout menus and using MSXML to generate SOAP requests for interactive content. It still sucks.

  • I Call Marketing Bull$hit (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Jesus IS the Devil ( 317662 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:37PM (#11758968)
    Am I missing something, or is this company coming in late to the party and trying to coin the term "Ajax" as if they started the party themselves? Sounds like marketing BS to me. Just take a look at some of their wording. It's as if Google used Adaptive Path to create their client-rich interfaces:

    Google is making a huge investment in developing the Ajax approach. All of the major products Google has introduced over the last year -- Orkut, Gmail, the latest beta version of Google Groups, Google Suggest, and Google Maps -- are Ajax applications. (For more on the technical nuts and bolts of these Ajax implementations, check out these excellent analyses of Gmail, Google Suggest, and Google Maps.) Others are following suit: many of the features that people love in Flickr depend on Ajax, and Amazon's A9.com search engine applies similar techniques.

  • I've been doing this for a while... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by venomkid ( 624425 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:44PM (#11759040)
    ..and it really is beautiful. XML backend, Javascript frontend... deliciously platform independent, fast, and dynamic as you wanna be. Once you overcome some of the cross browser weirdness, it's a breath of fresh air.

    (...but if someone says the word "Weblication" to my face I'll have to smack them.)

    vk.

  • XmlHttpRequest The Easy Way (Score:4, Informative)

    by coldcanofbeer ( 820296 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @04:59PM (#11759183) Homepage
    For an easy to understand tutorial of XmlHttpRequest, check out http://www.webpasties.com/xmlHttpRequest/ [webpasties.com]

    There you will be guided with baby steps on how to implement a city, state lookup based on zip.

    • That's a great tutorial there! The simplicity of the examples was key to figuring out what the minimum important parts to using this system is without being confused by the many cool things you can do with the system, but are extra.

      For those reading, I recommend that you follow that tutorial with this one [xml.com] which then goes into more depth on generic request/responce scripts and XML handling.

      Oh yeah, it took me a while to find these, so I'll add this list of pages that explained how to do the things that I w

  • Not First (Score:3, Informative)

    by xant ( 99438 ) on Wednesday February 23, 2005 @11:46PM (#11762547) Homepage
    Hi, try http://nevow.com and take a look at livepage and canvas. This isn't magic, people.

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