Product Description

Step-by-step guide reveals best practices for enhancing Web sites with Ajax

• A step-by-step guide to enhancing Web sites with Ajax.
• Uses progressive enhancement techniques to ensure graceful degradation (which makes sites usable in all browsers).
• Shows readers how to write their own Ajax scripts instead of relying on third-party libraries.

Web site designers love the idea of Ajax--of creating Web pages in which information can be updated without refreshing the entire page. But for those who aren't hard-core programmers, enhancing pages using Ajax can be a challenge. Even more of a challenge is making sure those pages work for all users. In Bulletproof Ajax, author Jeremy Keith demonstrates how developers comfortable with CSS and (X)HTML can build Ajax functionality without frameworks, using the ideas of graceful degradation and progressive enhancement to ensure that the pages work for all users. Throughout this step-by-step guide, his emphasis is on best practices with an approach to building Ajax pages called Hijax, which improves flexibility and avoids worst-case scenarios.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #143475 in Books
• Published on: 2007-02-19
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 216 pages

From the Back Cover

Step-by-step guide reveals best practices for enhancing Web sites with Ajax

• A step-by-step guide to enhancing Web sites with Ajax.
• Uses progressive enhancement techniques to ensure graceful degradation (which makes sites usable in all browsers).
• Shows readers how to write their own Ajax scripts instead of relying on third-party libraries.

Web site designers love the idea of Ajax--of creating Web pages in which information can be updated without refreshing the entire page. But for those who aren't hard-core programmers, enhancing pages using Ajax can be a challenge. Even more of a challenge is making sure those pages work for all users. In Bulletproof Ajax, author Jeremy Keith demonstrates how developers comfortable with CSS and (X)HTML can build Ajax functionality without frameworks, using the ideas of graceful degradation and progressive enhancement to ensure that the pages work for all users. Throughout this step-by-step guide, his emphasis is on best practices with an approach to building Ajax pages called Hijax, which improves flexibility and avoids worst-case scenarios.

About the Author
Working with the Web consultancy firm, Clearleft, Jeremy Keith creates elegant, usable Web sites using the troika of Web standards: CSS, (X)HTML, and the Document Object Model. He is a member of the Web Standards Project and joint lead of the DOM Scripting Task Force. He teaches hands-on Ajax and DOM Scripting in full-day workshops and is the author of DOM Scripting: JavaScript Web Design with JavaScript and the Document Object Model.

Customer Reviews

Fantastic introduction to AJAX
This is going to be a quick review, but this is a great book.

I bought Jeremy Keith's first book DOM Scripting and couldn't wait to read this, the authors second book.

I am a designer but have a have medium ranged skills in PHP and Javascript and found this book slightly below my level, but the code examples were explained enough for the smart newbie.

It certainly wont take your skills up to an advanced level of AJAX but its a fantastic introduction and will not only teach how to build an intermediate AJAX system, but the why and why not.

I can't recommend this book enough for anyone looking to get a foothold of AJAX which is now popping up everywhere on the web.

Really looking forward to the authors third book, which i really hope is in production.

Excellent, rapid introduction, for those who already know HTML and a little JS
I was a bit skeptical when I saw how slender this book was, and when the author started with a brush-up on JavaScript syntax, I began wondering whether there would be any 'meat'.

Pretty soon, though, I was well into the practicalities of Ajax, described clearly and succinctly, with even the warts (and all) mentioned in enough detail that I now feel confident enough to tackle multi-platform Ajax jobs. The various popular Ajax frameworks are discussed, and the most important pitfalls are negotiated on the basis of offering a wide range of solutions. At no time do you feel 'locked-in' to a particular framework or paradigm.

If you're a complete newcomer to web design, this book might be a bit of a challenge, but if you've been a bit around the houses, and know some HTML and Javascript already, this is THE Ajax book to buy. Why pay more for a few extra hundred 'baby's first website' pages you'll never read anyway?

Great introduction.
This book won't teach you about "advanced AJAX". This is primarily because there is no such thing as advanced Ajax. The concept is pretty straightforward.

What however isn't obvious, is the pros and cons of implementing Ajax itself. This is where this book stands out.

The non-intrusive approach to Ajax championed by this book is exactly the solution I needed to all my Ajax worries. I read this in conjunction with more detailled Ajax books, and this book really came into its own once I had appreciated more fully what Ajax was all about using the other books "Ajax and PHP" was one notable titlte; loads of worked examples and a sea anemone on the front cover.

It took a second read of this book to fully appreciate the author's intentions, abd I am so glad that I did. My sites are much better for it.

Unmissable.