"Looks" like Web 2.0!
Yesterday I was chatting with Sarah, who happens to be my so called chat buddy from the States. While we were just in between of a breezy chat this gal went up like... "Waaaaaw, check it out mate! This is so kewwl! Look how amazing this page looks, its got this mouse over effect when I roll my mouse over these flowers...its simply amzinnn, must be Web 2.0 AJAX, right?
Hello! There is definitely some confusion about Ajax, and in particular Web2.0. What you are seeing right now through Ajax is what the Flash guys were probably doing back during the world war. As a Technical Lead, yes I have fought AJAX based Web2.0 as any new dumb buzzword that comes around. I have to admit, there is definitely something in Web2.0. However, in my opinion, it’s got nothing to do with the technology as such. The effect that people like Sarah have been admiring is just a mere UI magic with the help of JS, and this certainly has been around for a long time and yet now it looks like people are realizing that Web2.0 is here and that is through the AJAX? Of all the languages AJAX!!! Gimme a break! In reality Flash gave you the same functionality ages back, and how come you call AJAX as web 2.0 now? Actually saying Flash introduced this buzzword "Web2.0".
But certainly AJAX is not Web2.0. It was right there back during the World War you see. But its like a ritual for the web that any new technology quickly becomes so pervasive that it's sometimes becomes hard enough to remember what things were like before it came to existence. Same is the case with Ajax, it actually is nothing but the same old shoes polished, wrapped up, kept in closet, forgot for a while and later remembered when the idiots over the fashion ramp started wearing the same looking shoes and you got that mistaken as the latest trend. AJAX as Web 2.0? Gimme a break. I actually freak out when I hear something like that.
Nothings changed, not even the usage. Ajax was actually present during the first big stretch of browser innovation, Netscape added a feature known as LiveScript, which allowed people to put small scripts in web pages so that they could continue to do things after you'd downloaded them. One early example was the Netscape form system, which would tell you if you'd entered an invalid value for a field as soon as you entered it, instead of after you tried to submit the form to the server. So later this happening LiveScript became JavaScript and grew more powerful, leading to a technique known as DHTML, which was typically used to make things fly around the screen and change around in response to user input like Sarah for her roll overs. “Neighbors” of Netscape surely did envy the popularity and the monopolistic strategies of the rich and famous provoked them to treat it as a taboo and that made the fall of the dynasty. Doing anything serious with Dynamic HTML actually started becoming more painful. People started dropping DHTML.
Slowly slowly things started getting monotonous with the same ol'HTML pages with nothing 'buzzy' and 'jazzy' to go about. At a certain point people accidentally collided with the DHTML functionality again and shortly thereafter the bubble finally burst and web development crashed. Not, however, before Microsoft added a little-known function call named XMLHttpRequest to IE5. Mozilla quickly followed the suit and, while nobody to the best of my knowledge used it, the function resided right there but completely idle with nobody taking the right advantage. XMLHttpRequest allowed the JavaScript inside web pages to do something that the people always wanted to do before, that is feed the ever hungry client from the server. JavaScript inside web pages talking to the outside world was like a dream come true. Google was apparently the first to realize the gravity of this change and with Gmail, they actually built applications that took advantage of this to provide a user interface that was much more like a web application. With Gmail, the application continuously asks the server if there's new email. If there is, then it live updates the page, it doesn't make you download a new one. And Google Maps lets you drag a map around and, as you do so, automatically downloads the parts of it you want to look at inline, without making you wait for a whole new page to download. Now that’s fantastic and if you see, what Google did was, it just wore the shoes you wrapped up long time ago, well probably a little cobbled version though.
Let me explain how I personally feel about the AJAX Web2.0 hype. It’s exactly like those shoes that google is wearing today Flash was wearing that ages ago and you too know Flash wears them since ages. Flash Player has penetrated at least 90% of the web market but great stalwarts never realized that. True, Flash can now connect to databases and do remoting for years. Flash pulls data dynamically and displays it on the fly, today you admire google videos and youtube, and thats just because Flash can even stream stuff coming straight from the server right to your face. Flash can also let users fill forms and push that to a database, make tricks with it and login the user. All done before, with no reload of your page. Flash also does animations and fade in/out or zoom effects in a much more elegant fashion. If you want to really see that, take a look at the newly introduced Social Networking Pod by Harbingers as "FlockPod" This is what they call it and I have a sample on my page right here. Just click on the handcuff like image below.
"NOTE: Click and drag on the POD top to move about the pod over the page"
They actually update the debate posts, poll results and do lots of things with this compact and fancy looking blue bubble. The best part is the integration part. Just a one line of code on any page makes you take an advantage of this bubbly application. Web2.0 made easy. FlockPod! Hatts off to you. Now if you ask me I’ll say that’s real Web 2.0. Actually applications like FlockPod should be the de'facto for Web 2.0.
And honestly Web 2.0 is nothing but just another mind opener, it’s a break through where a few people have realized that simplicity, consistency and a certain way of doing things were definitely improving the user experience. Its more of like a transformation of web Pages into web Applications. Actually Web2.0 has nothing to do with “hey look, this glitters when the I go entering the wrong data”. No. And actually saying that might as well bring a WAAWW! expression for a Biology scientist. Its just the traditional usage of JavaScript function! Don’t try to fool the world.
Hello! There is definitely some confusion about Ajax, and in particular Web2.0. What you are seeing right now through Ajax is what the Flash guys were probably doing back during the world war. As a Technical Lead, yes I have fought AJAX based Web2.0 as any new dumb buzzword that comes around. I have to admit, there is definitely something in Web2.0. However, in my opinion, it’s got nothing to do with the technology as such. The effect that people like Sarah have been admiring is just a mere UI magic with the help of JS, and this certainly has been around for a long time and yet now it looks like people are realizing that Web2.0 is here and that is through the AJAX? Of all the languages AJAX!!! Gimme a break! In reality Flash gave you the same functionality ages back, and how come you call AJAX as web 2.0 now? Actually saying Flash introduced this buzzword "Web2.0".
But certainly AJAX is not Web2.0. It was right there back during the World War you see. But its like a ritual for the web that any new technology quickly becomes so pervasive that it's sometimes becomes hard enough to remember what things were like before it came to existence. Same is the case with Ajax, it actually is nothing but the same old shoes polished, wrapped up, kept in closet, forgot for a while and later remembered when the idiots over the fashion ramp started wearing the same looking shoes and you got that mistaken as the latest trend. AJAX as Web 2.0? Gimme a break. I actually freak out when I hear something like that.
Nothings changed, not even the usage. Ajax was actually present during the first big stretch of browser innovation, Netscape added a feature known as LiveScript, which allowed people to put small scripts in web pages so that they could continue to do things after you'd downloaded them. One early example was the Netscape form system, which would tell you if you'd entered an invalid value for a field as soon as you entered it, instead of after you tried to submit the form to the server. So later this happening LiveScript became JavaScript and grew more powerful, leading to a technique known as DHTML, which was typically used to make things fly around the screen and change around in response to user input like Sarah for her roll overs. “Neighbors” of Netscape surely did envy the popularity and the monopolistic strategies of the rich and famous provoked them to treat it as a taboo and that made the fall of the dynasty. Doing anything serious with Dynamic HTML actually started becoming more painful. People started dropping DHTML.
Slowly slowly things started getting monotonous with the same ol'HTML pages with nothing 'buzzy' and 'jazzy' to go about. At a certain point people accidentally collided with the DHTML functionality again and shortly thereafter the bubble finally burst and web development crashed. Not, however, before Microsoft added a little-known function call named XMLHttpRequest to IE5. Mozilla quickly followed the suit and, while nobody to the best of my knowledge used it, the function resided right there but completely idle with nobody taking the right advantage. XMLHttpRequest allowed the JavaScript inside web pages to do something that the people always wanted to do before, that is feed the ever hungry client from the server. JavaScript inside web pages talking to the outside world was like a dream come true. Google was apparently the first to realize the gravity of this change and with Gmail, they actually built applications that took advantage of this to provide a user interface that was much more like a web application. With Gmail, the application continuously asks the server if there's new email. If there is, then it live updates the page, it doesn't make you download a new one. And Google Maps lets you drag a map around and, as you do so, automatically downloads the parts of it you want to look at inline, without making you wait for a whole new page to download. Now that’s fantastic and if you see, what Google did was, it just wore the shoes you wrapped up long time ago, well probably a little cobbled version though.
Let me explain how I personally feel about the AJAX Web2.0 hype. It’s exactly like those shoes that google is wearing today Flash was wearing that ages ago and you too know Flash wears them since ages. Flash Player has penetrated at least 90% of the web market but great stalwarts never realized that. True, Flash can now connect to databases and do remoting for years. Flash pulls data dynamically and displays it on the fly, today you admire google videos and youtube, and thats just because Flash can even stream stuff coming straight from the server right to your face. Flash can also let users fill forms and push that to a database, make tricks with it and login the user. All done before, with no reload of your page. Flash also does animations and fade in/out or zoom effects in a much more elegant fashion. If you want to really see that, take a look at the newly introduced Social Networking Pod by Harbingers as "FlockPod" This is what they call it and I have a sample on my page right here. Just click on the handcuff like image below.
"NOTE: Click and drag on the POD top to move about the pod over the page"
They actually update the debate posts, poll results and do lots of things with this compact and fancy looking blue bubble. The best part is the integration part. Just a one line of code on any page makes you take an advantage of this bubbly application. Web2.0 made easy. FlockPod! Hatts off to you. Now if you ask me I’ll say that’s real Web 2.0. Actually applications like FlockPod should be the de'facto for Web 2.0.
And honestly Web 2.0 is nothing but just another mind opener, it’s a break through where a few people have realized that simplicity, consistency and a certain way of doing things were definitely improving the user experience. Its more of like a transformation of web Pages into web Applications. Actually Web2.0 has nothing to do with “hey look, this glitters when the I go entering the wrong data”. No. And actually saying that might as well bring a WAAWW! expression for a Biology scientist. Its just the traditional usage of JavaScript function! Don’t try to fool the world.
