Today, I’ve decided to look around for some new web applications using the AJAX development technique.
Basically, AJAX’s aim is to have responsive web applications with maximal processing done on the client using Javascript. When some processing is required on the server (ex. for accessing a database or running a “secret” algorithm), the client Javascript use a XMLHttpRequest object to execute a script on the server which returns a ready-made XML object which can be traversed using DOM.
The main applications I’ve found so far using AJAX are:
- GMail
- Google Maps
- Google Suggest which is a fantastic addition to the Google search engine IMHO and
- Flickr
Quoting Flickr’s blurb,
“Flickr is the best way to store, sort, search and share your photos online. There is a huge mass of photos in the world, and Flickr provides a way to organize yours, and for you and your friends and family to tell your stories about them”
What is very nice is that Flickr and this WordPress weblog work incredibly well together. In fact, this post has been written in Flickr and, incidentally, the photo has been done by a couple in honeymoon in Mauritius.
