Re: Javascript on the client as an alternative to Perl/PHP/Python on the server

On Jun 1, 11:31 am, Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn <PointedE...@xxxxxx>
wrote:
Peter Michaux wrote:
On Jun 1, 3:56 am, Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn <PointedE...@xxxxxx> wrote:
Peter Michaux wrote:
Over the past while one of my work projects has amounted to an HTML
page that essentially looks like this: <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC
"-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";> <html> <head> <title>one-page
client-side app</title> <script src="library.js"
type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="app.js"
type="text/javascript"></script> </head> <body> </body> </html> The
app.js file loads all the necessary data using Ajax and JSON. The
body is dynamically built based on this data.
Very accessible. NOT.

I didn't claim it to be.

You claimed it to be working. Generally.

This architecture was not completely my choice. It was the result of
business requirements.

That does not make the result a good one.

It may be the very best result under certain business requirements.

[snip]

Diminishing an opinion by stating that the topic it discusses is subjective
is fallacious because all opinions are subjective. What matters is if an
opinion is well-founded or not. I think mine is, as I think I have
presented conclusive non-fallacious arguments to support it in the process.

yours may be well founded under certain business requirements. You may
not be considering other situations which result in other decisions.

When one decides to publish information on the web only, one is requiring
a reader to have a computer,

For suitable values of "computer". Computers come in different forms nowadays.

an internet connection

As much as it may surprise you, it is _not_ a necessity. Content can be
stored while the Internet connection is established and accessed later offline.

So at some point an internet connection is required.


and web browser (or similar program to get content off the web).

I can accept that as an axiom of no greater value: You need a Web user agent
to access Web content.

That is setting the bar quite high

High for whom?

High for those without a computer, internet connection, and/or web
browser.

and expensive.

Not necessarily.

It certainly is expensive to own a computer, internet connection and
web browser. For some people going to a 10 peso/hour internet cafe in
Mexico is expensive.

[snip]

If a publisher is willing to discard all potentially interested readers
that do not have an internet connection etc, then the publish could
subjectively decide that JavaScript is a requirement.

Which does not mean in any way that this decision is a reasonable one.

or an unreasonable one.

[snip]

It has become quite clear over my time reading comp.lang.javascript that
you believe you know the right way to do things

At least I can *justify* my design decisions.

As can I.

[snip]

I think that is a naive approach to assessing other's subjective
decisions without knowing all there decision making constraints.

I do not need to know the constraints to show that a decision is not
well-founded.

Then, in my opinion, your decision making process is broken. You
cannot engineer something unless you know the requirements. To believe
that there is one solution for all situations is naive.


We have also seen over time that you are doing some things objectively
wrong like serving XHTML as HTML.

Your fallacies are getting tiresome.

http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.javascript/msg/48e28a4ea7ec2903


I'm interested in people's comments on this approach.
It works.
It does not.

It absolutely does work for many users.

But not for as many if that path would not have been followed.

True. That may not be a net loss, however, when counting profit.


The document is empty.

That is not an argument about anything.

The value of the information in an empty document is zero and can fulfill no
purpose but to show that there is no information. I would deem this to be a
Bad Thing when the intent is to transport information.

The intent may not be to transport information in a document-like
format even though that was the original intent of the web. The web is
now being used as an application platform as well.

For a user with disabilities,

There are other strategies for supporting disabled users other than just
a single page gracefully degrading. I'm sure you can think of at least
five other strategies off the top of your head.

Yes, I can. However, I can also see the drawbacks that follow from them
and do weigh them against the greater advantages that follow from not
implementing them.

Do you agree that given certain business constraints perhaps you would
weight the advantages and disadvantages differently?

[snip]

a user behind a filtering proxy,

A business decision may be willing to sacrifice these users.

Which does not make this business decision a reasonable or economically
correct one.

It does not make it an incorrect one either.

In fact, it makes it a rather dubious one

maybe or maybe not.

if you consider that
it is seldom the case that an Web application is solely accessed from within
a local area network.

A web application may be on the general internet with a notice it
requires CSS, image, JavaScript, Flash, Quicktime support etc. These
would all be reasonable requirements in some circumstances.

a user with a not so sophisticated mobile device

Not all pages need to work on a mobile device.

I included "not so sophisticated" for a reason.

They don't need to work on not so sophisticated mobile devices.


As I've established above, a web page will require some describable set
of technologies to access it. It could be that for a particular page the
reader must have a modern desktop computer with a web browser that has
been released in the past year with all the bells and whistles turned on.

True. However, since that particular "page" would introduce a barrier that
all the other content does not, one has to reconsider whether it is
reasonable that this is the case or if it would instead be better if this
barrier would not be introduced.

You certainly are correct for some situations. For others the "wow
factor" that JavaScript provides may be the only reason a user decides
to use a particular website when others exist without JavaScript or
with JavaScript as progressive enhancements. In this situation using
JavaScript heavily may be exactly the reason a site is profitable.

[snip]

Peter
.

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