The Coming Return of AJAX.
I've been thinking about AJAX - not the Greek Hero, the technology - a lot lately. Of course, it's nothing new, blah blah Outlook Web Access blah blah DHTML blah blah IE 4.0. I totally hear you and I agree. It sucks that the folks that really conceived of DHTML aren't getting the props they deserve. But, that's the way of the 'net. That said, it's clear that folks are galvanized by the technology getting a sexy makeover (AJAX = sexy vs. DHTML = less so) but more that the technology really works. Sure Outlook Web Access is pretty, but it looks like crap in Firefox because it renders downlevel. (Aside, it'll be interesting to see if there will be an ASP.NET 2.5 or something earth-shattering coming soon. From what I hear from contacts at public facing MS properties there's some amazing things coming that will melt our faces if we knew.)
Anyway, I've been collecting AJAX stuff in an attempt to grok what's coming and reconcile it with many years of JavaScript (née LiveScript) and these past years of ASP.NET. There a number of things happening all at the same time and the confluence of standards like XML, ECMAScript, the new data format JSON (pronounced "Jason" - The JavaScript Object Notation) along with specs to make the J and X in AJAX work better together plus broad browser support for XHTML and CSS is really bringing the promise of a Web that we were originally promised in 1996. The young people are calling it Web 2.0. Um, OK. If you lived through the BBS days, VT100, Lynx, Mosaic, AOL in DOS, CompuServe, Prodigy, and the pox that was Netscape 4, you realize it's Web 13.0.
Anil also makes a good point about the coming of dampening (another word for common sense + good design) as a design feature. Some folks may poo-poo the shiny and glare that is Windows Vista (and CodeRush for that matter) as eye-candy, but they will eventually die off and fade away. Well, they won't fade away, they will disappear instantly without a visual cue as to why they left. Regardless, let's put these Pentium 4s to work doing something more interesting than rebooting quickly.
Here's some AJAX useful links I've collected. Incidently, some were found during my recent GTD obsession/adoption.
Now playing: Musiq Soulchild - Just Friends  [ComputerZen.com - Scott Hanselman]
8:49:34 AM 
|
|
