Foundations of Ajax

Ajax is hot news for developers! With examples like Google Maps, Google Suggest, Gmail, and Tada List, we have highly dynamic web applications that are nearly as feature rich as their thick client brethren. Using the Ajax techniques in this book, you can provide your customers with the rich user experience they have come to expect while still enjoying the ease of deployment you've come to expect of web applications.

In this Ajax book you will also learn that browser-based applications have none of the complex distribution problems that plague thick-client applications. Once a browser-based application is deployed to the Web server, it is available to all users without the need for a costly, complex, and error-prone installation process. Browser-based applications are accessible from any platform with a modern Web browser, whether the operating system is Windows, Unix, Mac OS X, or Linux.

As the authors point out in this book, an Ajax application is very similar to the web applications we're already familiar with. It's made from many of the same components and operates in the same way and to the same standards. The difference is that it incorporates an "Ajax engine" that negates the start-stop nature of traditional web interaction and drives the whole process along. A quick look at an Ajax application like Google Maps will demonstrate the difference to the user experience very clearly. Gone are the constant page-refreshes and instead the user is presented with a smooth, responsive interface that seamlessly reacts to their requests.