techno.blog("Dion")

You gotta love adding to “JS?” acronyms. Now we have JavaScript Templates, which, as Aslak talks about, can work well in the new world of Ajax.

Here

          

There has been a lot of talk regarding the amazing new UIs that we can build with XmlHttpRequest, and the like ( a la Google Maps, TadaList, etc ).

Jesse James Garrett has given this set of technology a new name, and talks about it in Ajax: A New Approach to Web Applications.

I am extremely excited about the technology, but can’t agree more with Jason Fried when he calls for some caution.

As with all ‘new ways of doint it’, we need to make sure that we don’t confuse the users. One of the sad truths of UI work, is that you often have to keep your UI in a state that users are used too, even if the purist in you thinks they know a better way.

So, its time for us to get creative, but end up with an interface that is as usable, as much as it blows away the customers! :)

I am really excited about XmlHttpRequest being available in the major browsers.

One of the main reasons is that I think it really enables componentization.

Take the example of a portal, with 10 components on the screen. In the past the web application would have to round-trip to the server, and rerender everything. What a waste of time!

Now, with XHR, each component can talk back to the server if it needs too, and the rest of the page stays put.

Ok, more efficient, but is it that big a deal?

I think it is. The real power comes in when you think about having plugged in those 10 components from DIFFERENT SOURCES. That works just fine now, whereas it would be a real PITA as the portal software would have to coordinate everything in the past. Now, each component truly is its own component, and our clients talk directly to its server-side representation.

I expect to see a lot more ideas such as Y!Q, that make use of this.

I found out about TaDaList.com from Jim Weirich:

I just came across this one today, and its the real reason I started this blog entry. Wow, what a simple idea. And so beautifully executed. Notice the lack of submit buttons. Just start typing todo list entries, hitting a return to go to the next one. Finished a todo item and want to check it off? Just check the box

Sometimes it can be a little painful, or I should say, restricting working with browsers as a client UI.

Features like XML HTTP Request definitely help out. It is great to be able to shoot off a message on the background and not have to rerender pages all of the time.

Before XMLHttpRequest, we had to do various hacks. Maybe involving opening tiny windows, using Applets, or whatever sneaky tool we can think off.

If you have an app that needs to poke back to the server check it out.

Reading code such as:

xmlhttp.open(”GET”, “test.txt”, true);

again makes me love Named Parameters:

xmlhttp.open(httpmethod:”GET”, url:”test.txt”, asyncFlag: true);

It would help my readability at least.