HTML5 Programming with JavaScript For Dummies

Chapter 17

Cleaning Up the Web with AJAX

In This Chapter

Understanding how AJAX can benefit your applications

Using JavaScript alone to create an AJAX application

Using jQuery with AJAX

Chapter 16 introduces you to XML, which is essentially a means of storing textual data in a structured way so that it retains its original context but is easily used by any platform. In that chapter, you see a basic example of what amounts to a database. This chapter looks at XML from a new perspective — as a means of exchanging data with a server and of updating parts of a Web page without reloading an entire page. This technology is called Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX). It isn’t a new language but merely a new way to use existing standards to perform specialized tasks.

This chapter provides a simple overview of AJAX. You’ve probably seen AJAX at work in the past. This programming technique is used to create some of the effects used by Google Maps, Gmail, YouTube, and Facebook (amongst many others). When you complete this chapter, you’ll know more about AJAX and how it can help you create applications that are more flexible and dynamic.

Introducing AJAX

Many developers have heard of AJAX, ...