Building Responsive Web Applications with AJAX and PHP is the most practical and efficient resource a reader can get to enter the exciting world of AJAX. This book will teach you how to create faster, lighter, better web applications by using the AJAX ingredients technologies to their full potential. Assuming a basic knowledge of PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL, this book will help you understand how the heart of AJAX beats and how the constituent technologies work together. After teaching the foundations, the book will walk you through eight real-world case studies covering tasks you’ll be likely to need for your own applications: - AJAX enabled form-validation page - Online chat room - Customized type-ahead text entry solution, that helps users find the help page for the PHP functions - A simple cards game that supports multiple simultaneous sessions - Whiteboard where online users can draw online - Database-enabled, editable and customizable data grid - RSS aggregator application - Use the script.aculo.us JavaScript toolkit to build a drag&drop enabled sortable list The appendixes guide you through installing your working environment, using powerful tools that enable debugging, improving, and profiling your code, working with XSLT and XPath, and working with existing AJAX frameworks.

Get an expert introduction to the new JavaScript enhancements (code-named “Atlas”) for Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0. More than a basic AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript And XML) script library, the Microsoft implementation brings object orientation to JavaScript, together with enhanced client-side and server-side controls that greatly simplify coding while delivering enhanced Web experiences with any browser. Scheduled for release with the next version of Microsoft Visual Studio®, code named “Orcas,” AJAX extensions and tools can be used by developers today. This book offers expert insights direct from the Microsoft product team and noted ASP authority Dino Esposito, as well as hands-on instruction and examples of Web development with AJAX. This ideal reference will be updated online, keeping readers up to date with the evolving tool. The book includes code samples in ASP.NET 2.0 created using C# and JavaScript.

Key Book Benefits:

- Provides coverage of both client-side and server-side development

- Covers ASP.NET AJAX 1.0, as released in January 2007

- Features Online Product Extensions for updated code samples during the continuing development process

“Ajax is short for “Asynchronous JavaScript+CSS+DOM+XMLHttpRequest.”

Even if you weren’t intimidated before, that tidbit is probably enough to make you reach for the Excedrin. Just reach for Ajax For Dummies instead. With screen shots, actual code and explanations, and live Web sites where you can see Ajax applications doing their thing, it will have you using Ajax to create Web applications that look an act like desktop applications in no time. With Ajax, you can speed up and clean up your Web applications. Shoppers at your online store can fill their carts without waiting for multiple page refreshes. Searchers on your sites can get instant results on the same page.

This guide takes you on a tour of how Ajax is used today, complete with examples of Ajax applications in action, such as an Ajax-enabled Yahoo! search or an Ajax-based chat application. Then it gives you basics on using JavaScript. After that you dive in and get info on:

* Writing some Ajax, interactive mouseovers using Ajax, passing data to the server with GET or POST, and more
* Connecting to Google for a live search
* Using free Ajax frameworks so you don’t have to start from scratch, including Ajax Gold (written specifically for this book), AJAXLib, and grabbing XML with libXmlRequest
* All kinds of Ajax techniques, such as using Ajax for drag-and-drop operations, pop-up menus, downloading images behind the scenes, and more
* Using SACK (simple AJAX code kit), decoding XML with Sarissa, and creating visual effects with Rico
* Handling XML int Ajax Applications
* Working with cascading style sheets (CCS) in Ajax, including setting up the styles, displaying a menu, styling text, handling colors and backgrounds, and more
* Working with Ajax and PHP

Complete with a companion Web site, free Ajax frameworks, and sample code you can use, Ajax for Dummies is your friendly guide to creating truly user-friendly Web sites!

This practical guide shows you how to make your Java web applications more responsive and dynamic by incorporating new Ajaxian features, including suggestion lists, drag-and-drop, and more. Java developers can choose between many different ways of incorporating Ajax, from building JavaScript into your applications “by hand” to using the new Google Web Toolkit (GWT).

Ajax on Java starts with an introduction to Ajax, showing you how to write some basic applications that use client-side JavaScript to request information from a Java servlet and display it without doing a full page reload. It also presents several strategies for communicating between the client and the server, including sending raw data, and using XML or JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) for sending more complex collections of data.

The book then branches out into different approaches for incorporating Ajax, which include:

• The Prototype and script.aculo.us Javascript libraries, the Dojo and Rico libraries, and DWR
• Integrating Ajax into Java ServerPages (JSP) applications
• Using Ajax with Struts
• Integrating Ajax into Java ServerFaces (JSF) applications
• Using Google’s GWT, which offers a pure Java approach to developing web applications: your client-side components are written in Java, and compiled into HTML and JavaScript

Ajax gives web developers the ability to build applications that are more interactive, more dynamic, more exciting and enjoyable for your users. If you’re a Java developer and haven’t tried Ajax, but would like to get started, this book is essential. Your users will be grateful.

Learn to build dynamic, interactive web applications using the two most important approaches to web development today: Ajax and the phenomenally efficient Ruby on Rails platform. This book teaches intermediate to advanced web developers how to use both Ajax and Rails to quickly build high-performance, scalable applications without being overwhelmed with thousands of lines of JavaScript code. More than just recipes, you also get a thorough, low-level understanding of what’s happening under the hood.

• Ajax on Rails includes three fully worked out Rails/Ajax applications, and quick reference sections for Prototype and script.aculo.us.
• Testing lessons show you how to eliminate cross-browser JavaScript errors and DOM debugging nightmares using a combination of Firebug, and Venkman.
• Advanced material explains the most current design practices for Ajax usability. You’ll learn to avoid user experience mistakes with proven design patterns.

Beyond the how-to, Ajax on Rails helps you consider when Ajax is (and isn’t) appropriate, and the trade-offs associated with it. For those new to Rails, this book provides a quick introduction, the big picture, a walk through the installation process, and some tips on getting started. If you’ve already started working with Rails and seek to deepen your skill set, you’ll find dozens of examples drawn from real-world projects, exhaustive reference for every relevant feature, and expert advice on how to “Ajaxify” your applications.

Professional Ajax 2nd Edition provides a developer-level tutorial of Ajax techniques, patterns, and use cases. The book begins by exploring the roots of Ajax, covering how the evolution of the web and new technologies directly led to the development of Ajax techniques. A detailed discussion of how frames, JavaScript, cookies, XML, and XMLHttp requests (XHR) related to Ajax is included. After this introduction, the book moves on to cover the implementation of specific Ajax techniques. Request brokers such as hidden frames, dynamic iframes, and XHR are compared and contrasted, explaining when one method should be used over another. To make this discussion clearer, a brief overview of HTTP requests and responses is included. Once a basic understanding of the various request types is discussed, the book moves on to provide in-depth examples of how and when to use Ajax in a web site or web application. Different data transmission formats, including plain text, HTML, XML, and JSON are discussed for their advantages and disadvantages. Also included is a discussion on web services and how they may be used to perform Ajax techniques. Next, more complex topics are covered. A chapter introducing a request management framework explores how to manage all of the requests inside of an Ajax application. Ajax debugging techniques are also discussed.

The last part of the book walks through the creation of two full-fledged Ajax web applications. The first, FooReader.NET, is an Ajax-powered RSS reader. The second, called AjaxMail, is an Ajax-enabled email system. Both of these applications incorporate many of the techniques discussed throughout the book.

Professional Ajax 2nd edition is written for Web application developers looking to enhance the usability of their web sites and web applications and intermediate JavaScript developers looking to further understand the language. Readers should have familiarity with XML, XSLT, Web Services, PHP or C#, HTML, CSS. This book is not aimed at beginners without a basic understanding of the aforementioned technologies. Also, a good understanding of JavaScript is vitally important to understanding this book. Those readers without such knowledge should instead refer to books such as Beginning JavaScript, Second Edition (Wrox, 2004, ISBN: 978-0-7645-5587-9) and Professional JavaScript for Web Developers (Wrox, 2005, ISBN: 978-0-7645-7908-0).

Professional Ajax 2nd edition adds nearly 200 pages of new and expanded coverage compared to the first edition. Some of the new topics covered here include:

• Ajax Libraries including the Yahoo! Connection Manager, Prototype, and jQuery
• Request Management with Priority Queues and the RequestManager Object
• Comet push-based web systems and HTTP streaming
• Maps and Mashups with Geocoding, Google Maps API and Yahoo! Maps API
• Ajax Debugging with FireBug and Microsoft Fiddler ASP.NET AJAX Extensions (formerly code-named “Atlas”)

And of course the Second Edition retains and updates the core first edition content including:

• the range of request brokers (including the hidden frame technique, iframes, and XMLHttp) and explains when one should be used over another
• different Ajax techniques and patterns for executing client-server communication
• Ajax patterns including predictive fetch, page preloading, submission throttling, incremental field and form validation, periodic refresh, multi-stage download and more
• Syndication with RSS, Atom, and XParser
• JSON and creating an autosuggest textbox example
• web site widgets for a news ticker, weather information, web search, and site search
• Ajax Frameworks JSpan, DWR, and Ajax.NET Professional
• A Web-based RSS/Atom aggregator case study
• An AjaxMail case study

Are you ready to build more responsive web applications with richer UI elements? This detailed guide to the Microsoft AJAX Library shows you how to bring together ASP.NET 2.0 with an object-oriented approach to JavaScript development using this new framework from Microsoft. You’ll gain an in-depth understanding of the ASP.NET AJAX architecture, including the server controls, client-side JavaScript library, and runtime environment. By following the numerous examples, you’ll see how much your users benefit from this new class of web applications that manipulate the browser’s DOM and communicate with the server to update the user’s view of a page without waiting for the entire page to be refreshed.

Written by Microsoft’s lead ASP.NET AJAX developer together with an in-the-field Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional), this book guides you through the core of the Microsoft AJAX Library and the controls you will use to leverage AJAX. It provides you with code samples to take advantage of some of the popular shared-source ASP.NET AJAX Toolkit controls and extensions. And you’ll work through debugging functionality in Visual Studio® and the browser as well as methods for effective testing.

What you will learn from this book

• How to create a better user experience by adding more dynamic UIs
• Steps for accessing ASP.NET profile and authentication services
• Ways to simplify programming tasks using the Microsoft AJAX Library
• Strategies for testing web applications to achieve optimal performance
• Methods for developing custom AJAX controls

Get Professional ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX