A couple of months ago I started reading about Ajax. I have to admit, the more I read the more excited I become. As a web application developer I am constantly looking at ways to improve my web applications. Client-side web development is one of the ways I and my team have embraced. Some developers develop web apps like they are dumb terminals or green screen apps and do all of their processing server-side. Not us, we take advantage of each PC that connects to our web apps and use THEIR power.
The way we would normally do this would be to get as much "raw" data as possible and send it to the browser and then use Javascript to manipulate, validate, etc. the data that was sent on the initial page download. Sometimes our raw data was in the form of xml, and other times in was simply javascript arrays. For our xml data we often use XSLT for the heavy lifting. Turns out that our approach for developing web apps was pretty close to the Ajax approach.
So, what is Ajax?
I think it was Jesse James Garrett who first coined the term Ajax in an essay on Adaptive Path. In his essay, Jess does a great job at defining what Ajax is. To me, Ajax is a technique to get data on-the-fly from a web page without having to submit the page to a web server.
Where do I plan to use Ajax
In the next several weeks I plan to use Ajax in my Domino Web Tools project on OpenNTF. The first deliverable is to add the ability to expand multiple categories in my xml/xslt views. Later, I plan to also add the ability to scroll thru a view and use Ajax to request more and more data as the view is being scrolled. No longer will you need to have previous and next links on a web page. The view will behave just like in the Lotus Notes client. Should be AWESOME!!!
Who else in the Domino community is using Ajax?
Here's who I've tracked down so far that have dabled with Ajax in Domino. Do you know of anymore? Or of any "real-world" domino apps that are using Ajax?
We are using AJAX a lot at my company. As a concrete example we are using it for background searches in our Helpdesk product.
/lekkim
Well, a Toronto-based company, PointAlliance, has been making extensive (and, I have to say, impressive) use of Ajax for quite a while in their LP4W (Launch Pad for Web) CMS product. A lot of what they've done has been IE-only, at least in the past, but that's because their implementation actually predates the Mozilla/Konqueror version of the XMLHttpRequest object.
Then there's my own stuff, where I replaced iframe updates with Ajax simply to get rid of the annoying nav clicks that iframe location refreshes create in IE. The Ajax versions are more verbose and reduce the concurrent-user number for my near-real-time update applications (including an online auction) by about 25%, and the client-side update is slower as well (although if the debug flags aren't set in my JS, the user isn't aware of the lag). Is the performance hit a Good Thing? No, but the decrease in user complaints is.
By the way, I'll be turning in a scouring-powder version of Open WebCalendar soon. It'll still use an outline view to solve the categorization problem, and it'll use custom XML and a $$ViewTemplate to feed values that wouldn't be available in the view, but the Ajax version would allow the calendar to be placed on a host page that does not, itself, need to be refreshed. Look for it soon at a Domino open-source site near you.
Yes .. i have been using it since a long time ( probably 1.5 yrs ) and its cool.
Search Domino ( got me an iPod Mini !!) :
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On my blog :
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On ND6 forum :
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via Richard Schwartz
Hey all the more reason to do and get a copy of DXLPeek! { Link }
DXLPeek is a suite of DXL tools. On the front you have Ajax displaying Notes via DXL. In the back you have a service fetching DXL for just about anything on your server.
All Domino!
Hi Jack!
We are using your great xml-xslt views since it was only a tip in OpenNtf, remember? Well we made some modifications to suite our needs, and I want to show you that and discuss some ideas. We are using Ajax for 1,5 years now and we call it here of "remote scripting". We used this to implement read/unread marks in our views and documents in web. It´s great. We can press the insert key in a view to mark/unmark a document whitout sending the page to the server. The next thing we are discussing to put in the view is exactly the feature to scroll the view and not to fetch next and previous page (something like the DWA, but something that works ;) ). We were glad to help you in achiving this, so we can do a lot faster then alone. Please, feel free in sending me an e-mail so we can discuss this and help each other.
Best Regards,
Werther
Jack,
I'm interested in your scrolling view. I've taken some of Julian's sample code to implement another Notes client feature that's missing on the web...the ability to start typing and have the view pop to the closest entry in the view. In my initial tests, I was surprised at how quick the response time is.
I did a presentation on this (AJAX and Domino) recently in Dallas for the user group and am doing it again tomorrow in Houston. I'd love to update my
content with mentions of your work. If you've got some references, please send them to me.
Hi
I working on som AJAX stuff for which i think is going to be pretty cool. It is coded for Domino but it should easy to move to other platforms. I am very busy at the moment so I am having problems finding the time to finish the first release of the code and writing an article about it. Hopefuly within a month you will be able to see it at { Link }
best regards Jesper Kiaer
We've actually got an AJAX replacement for the Domino View Applet (somewhat similar to the WebTools views). It's quick and essentially recreates the Java View Applet in a no-java-required form. It works in IE 5.0+, Netscape 6.1+, and Firefox 1.0+, is completely CSS-enabled, etc. etc.
Jack, we need to talk at some point. I'd love to discuss possibly merging the two tools together to reduce redundant efforts.