Ajax: plenty of room for improvement)

While Ajax has set the world on fire and caused a renaissance in user experience, it is not the best rich Internet application (RIA) technology available today. the technology, or "approach" as some like to say, suffers from serous problems. first, it's not completely portable guest SS browsers. while most Ajax functionality works fine tuning SS Firefox and Microsoft IE, its not 100%. people initially Enthusiastic about Ajax as a cross platform de facto standard quickly discover the corner cases where functionality that works well in Microsoft IE, doesn' t work in Firefox and vice versa. and don't even talk about opera and Safari! While I'm confident that the enormous momentum around und Ajax will force browser providers to fix these inconsistencies, as it stands today there are still interoperability problems. adobe's Flex 2 platform, which is based on the Flash Player, doesn' t have this problem. adobe is the only provider of the plug-in, so the implementation is consistent guest SS browsers. in addition, adoption of newer versions of the Flash Player is wickedly fast compared to consistent adoption of new Ajax standards (e.g. CCS, JavaScript, DOM ). the same can be said for Java: the Java Plug-in is provided by Sun Microsystems and provides a consistent presentation between SS browsers.

another area where Ajax really needs to advance is in terms of tooling. while there are some nice Ajax development tools coming out of vendors such as Microsoft, backbase, tibco, and nexaweb-the truth is Ajax ides are still pretty primitive compared to what we have for Java and Adobe's Flex 2. in fact, given a choice I wowould much rather work with Adobe Flex 2 than Ajax simply because the tooling is much better. while the Ajax ide market is still underdeveloped, the number of Code-level Ajax frameworks and APIs available today is ridiculous. at my last count (August 2006) there were something like 160 Ajax frameworks. the other day someone told me-this is not been substantiated-that number is closer to 300 today. while I like the Apache adage, "Let a thousand flowers bloom" there is a point where the sheer diversity of options is anti-productive to the industry as a whole.

here is another problem with Ajax, it's not very deep. compare the Javascript libraries encoded in even the best Ajax toolkits with the Java platform, Standard Edition. ajax pales in comparison when it comes to the number of features and functionality. although the hundreds of JavaScript libraries available today may collectively provide as much functionality as Java SE, including them all in a development environment and picking among redundant libraries make it impossible for Ajax to complete with Java today in terms of platform breadth.

There are today three leading platforms for developing rich Internet applications: Ajax, Adobe Flash Player (with Adobe Flex 2 or openlaszlo), and Java Plug-in (used with Java applets ). none of these solutions are perfect-they all offer some advantage over the others. the fact that Ajax has ignited a renewed interest in making the web a much better user experience is to be applauded, but don't confuse the hype around the technology with the basic facts about the strengths and weakness of Ajax compared to its counterparts, Adobe Flex and the Java Plug-in. ajax is good, but there is plenty of room for improvement.

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Translation:

Three major deficiencies, Ajax technology still needs to be improved

 

Currently, Ajax has become a popular technology and has brought about a regression of user experience concerns. However, Ajax is not currently the best Ria technology. Ajax technology, or "method", is facing some outstanding problems as some people have said.

First, cross-browser operations are not fully supported.

Although most of Ajax currently works normally in Firefox and Microsoft IE browsers, It is not 100%. People initially think that AJAX can run on any browser across platforms, but in fact people quickly find that it can only work under Microsoft's IE and does not support Firefox, not to mention opera and safari. Although I am confident that a large number of Ajax problems will encourage browser vendors to solve these inconsistencies, Ajax still has cross-platform running problems today. However, Adobe's Flex 2 based on Flash Player does not have this problem. Adobe is only a vendor of embedded interfaces and has been committed to cross-browser middleware applications. In addition, the new flash player soon became available with new Ajax standards (such as CSS, JavaScript, and DOM ). The same product applies to Java, and the Java Plug-In provided by Sun can also run across browsers.

Second, another substantive issue for Ajax improvement is development tools. Although there are some development tools such as Microsoft, backbase, tibco and nexaweb, the real Ajax IDE is still very backward compared with Java and Adobe's Flex 2. In fact, the reason why I prefer to use Adobe Flex 2 instead of AJAX is that the development tools of Adobe Flex 2 are more convenient. The current Ajax ide market is not yet mature, but there are a considerable number of coding-level Ajax framework works and APIs, which is ridiculous. According to my statistics (as of 2006 in April), at least 160 Ajax framework works were available. One day, people around me told me that my statistics are not comprehensive, and this number is close to 300. Just like my favorite Apache motto: "a thousand flowers and flowers", purely diversified choices are not advantageous for the development of the entire industry.

Third, there is another problem with Ajax, which is not in-depth. Taking the included JavaScript class library as an example, Ajax looks pale in terms of personalization and functionality, by comparing the most complete Ajax Tool with the Java Standard Edition. Hundreds of JavaScript class libraries are added to the java standard version, and they are used and redundant labels are selected in the development environment. Ajax is unlikely to compete with the current Java in terms of platform width.

In the development of RIA technology, there are three main platforms: Ajax, Adobe Flash Player (including Adobe Flex 2 or openlaszlo), and Java Plug-in (used together with Java applets ). Currently, no solution is perfect, and each of them has a better advantage than each other: in fact, the most commendable highlight of AJAX is that it gives pages a better user experience, instead of focusing on its own advantages and disadvantages, it should be lost in comparison with similar technologies Adobe Flex and Java Plug-in.

In short, Ajax is good, but there are still many aspects that should be improved.

Link: http://rmh.blogs.com/weblog/2007/04/ajax_plenty_of_.html