It has been a while since I’v done any real web user interface design. The past several years I’ve been working mainly on the server side of things.
However in light of the recent (as in past 3 years) development of HTML’s marriage to XML, there is once again more web tech candy that grabs my attention.
Remember the feeing of your first javascript/dhtml mouse-over event? back in the days when you use to visit builder.com, webmonkey.com, hotwired.com to get your latest “fix” on the cool web UI tricks? It seems that another round of innovative web technologies are surfacing. Take for instance the very cool user interfaces of our favorite search startup, google. Notice how in their gmail UI, everything seems to load magically in the background without causing the user to wait for incoming mail or having the ability to iterate through a message thread without waiting.. makes you wonder, how did they do that?
Well as it turns out there’s a new technology that Jesse James Garrett has nailed, calling it Ajax: Asyncrhonous Javascript + XML. Essentially, Ajax is not one technology but a set of technologies spanning JavaScript, XMLHttpRequest, XML, DOM, XSLT, and HTTP. In a nutshell the Ajax suite enhances the user-experience without the use of thirdparty plugins like applets and/or flash media. Granted, pure native HTML UIs are still no where near the richness and complexity of Desktop interfaces.. however AJax is a step in the right direction.
Mr. Garret has founded a web company called adaptive path in which they specialize in very innovative and “user-centered” user interfaces. He’s written a book that I look forward to reading called, The Elements of User Experience
In his most recent essay, Garrett distills this new wave of UI technology that has the potential of giving the web its second round of excitement just as the JavaScript/DHTML days did.
adaptive path � ajax: a new approach to web applications
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