Minnesota Lotus Notes User Group AJAX and Lotus

Minnesota Lotus Notes User Group AJAX and Lotus John Smart Partner Grey. Duck Technology, Inc John. Smart@Grey. Duck. com 651. 283. 8689

AJAX • What is AJAX? • Basics • Why IBM Lotus Domino works well for AJAX • Examples • Bigger-Picture Lessons Learned

What is AJAX • • Asynchronous Javascript And XML Not a technology, a technique Other elements involved: DOM, CSS, DHTML Supported by most major browsers

AJAX: The Basics 1. Event triggered on a page… (e. g. user clicked on something, timeout, on. Load event, etc. ) 2. … a request goes out from the browser, browser sets up a “when I get an answer, run this Java. Script function” trigger… 3. … meanwhile, user can still do things… 4. … if/when the browser gets answer, it’s passed to the designated Java. Script function. © 2005 Adaptive Path, LLC

IBM Lotus Domino and AJAX • Domino’s native support for XML and Javascript – Read. View. Entries – Server agents and web services that emit XML – Apply CSS easily • Much control over how XML and HTML are emitted • Well-integrated DB and web tasks - Don’t have to deal with two different vendors (though you can) DWA (i. Notes) uses AJAX

Examples • • • Google Maps Object. Graph’s Dictionary Julian Robichaux’s Zip Code Example Face. Lift For Domino (unfinished) Ultimate Domino View Navigator (Example) LDDMonkey for LDD (also from Julian)

My Take-aways • Some of the stuff I’ve done in the past will look outdated sooner than I’d thought. (E. g. web pages that refresh when a keyword is changed. ) • Java. Script has arrived! Packaged libraries are getting more and more sophisticated. Rather than reinventing the wheel, “prototype. js” is a de facto standard for AJAX coding. • Face. Lift was one of a few Domino “meta coding” sessions at Lotusphere. There seem to be more and more design frameworks and more of an emphasis on reusability than I’ve seen before.

Ready? Go! • • Wikipedia’s page on AJAX Prototype. js Comprehensive JS library list Mastering AJAX (IBM Developer. Works)