Re: Attempt to de-mystify AJAX

"Luke Webber" <luke@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:436e8ebd_1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> dawn wrote:
>> I recognize this is now way to long and not too pretty, but I'll click
>> send anyway.
[SNIPP]
> In any case, this raises another argument that I have against the browser
> as a pervasive platform. You have to code stuff both in the browser and
> back on the serve, in two different languages. You're pretty well doubling
> the workload. And you're passing stuff back and forth in XML, which is far
> from being the most efficient data representation known to man. What's
> with that?

My 2+ cents. 1) Don't see how you can avoid coding in several languages. For
my part, I have server code in UV Basic, and JS. There is obviously some
other layers in between but it's so minimal it's basically static code. Ok,
so how can we possibly improve on 2 languages? There are also a couple of
ActiveX objects but I just use 'em, and they've been pretty static too.

2) All the concerns about mixing UI/business logic and what have you. In
reality, how critical is this? Now, I hardly ever write any end-user
applications in our product, but the product itself is probably the most
complex application, so I've plenty of experience with that. So do I worry
about the distinction between where and what language to code in? No. If
it's server side stuff like almost all of it is, it's coded in Basic. Almost
all of the JS is control stuff, with some obvious exceptions, client-side
validation being one. When I say control stuff, I mean UI for the most part.
Btw, application programmers are discourged from JS, but they code plenty of
snippets when they need to.

3) we don't pass stuff back and forth in XML, unless there's a layer I'm not
aware of. Showing my deliberate ignorance, I will state that the clientside
submit JS seems to pass name/value pairs of data. This magically appears in
the gateway Basic program as (guess what) a dynamic array (there is a little
C glue code somewhere), so you pick off the value of a variable by a Locate
on the name string.

How much more easy than that can it get? The data set is comprised of
control information (typically static, so while it's a couple of dozen
name/value pairs now, it could be reduced to one or two, since the session
handle can lead you to all the rest server-side). And the actual data,
which, as I've mentioned before, is only user changed data to keep the
traffic low. While at present the changes are cumulative till Save or Cancel
(kinda like an incremental filesave), it could just as well update state on
the server on every server call, thereby further minimizing traffic (since
only the changes from the last submit would then be submitted).

So I read all this stuff : worries about browser technology, fears about
obsolescence, the relative merits of different languages, etc and wonder why
it's been so easy for me (so far).I really see a "theoretical" concern here
that's hard to see in reality. Sort of like worrying about which cell phone
to buy, because if you worry too much you'll never get one because it's
outdated. Also, if there's concern about multiple languages,what's with the
endless speculation about new ones?

> Google as part of a live application? Spare me!
>
>>>The Web should be for casual users to view your products and services,
>>>and submit the odd order or email request. Or for in-house distributuon
>>>of information. It should never have gone so far as to become a
>>>full-blown application delivery vehicle. The Oracle Has Spoken. Amen. <g>
>>
>> HUGE disagreement sir oracle.

Totally agree with Dawn here.

> And let's not forget that you're shipping all this data around using XML.
> How many round trips do you really want to make with all that extra bloat?
See above.

> I happen to believe that JS actively encourages such errors, but perhaps
> jslint will go some way towards dealing with those issues.

Examples, please. Other than the obvious non-typed vars (which imo don't
lead to any "more" errors), and declaring vars (which may).

>>>> And the more Javascript you have, the harder it
>>>>>is to guarantee cross-browser support.

If you KIS, javascript will run on any browser. It's not the JS that's the
problem,. it's the html - layers vs divs, different referencing mechanisms,
different rendering techniques, etc etc. Also not mentioned so far in this
thread is the biggest bugaboo of all when using browsers- the user's
preferences. You have to watch out pretty closely to not use a feature that
can be negated, or test for it at least.

Chandru Murthi.


.

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