Re: AJAX...

Brad,
Yes, Ajax, i.e., the XMLHttpRequest object supports receiving "data". 
The "default" or "normal" or "usual" or "original" intent was to return XML to
the browser, but it allows you to return anything, including HTML, raw data,
Javascript or XML. 
I tend to use XML in my AJAX apps, but that' doesn't mean everyone does or
should.
Sorry for being a be too specific, I tend to do that lately. <tic>

-Bob Cozzi
www.iSeriesTV.com
Ask your Manager to watch iSeriesTV.com


-----Original Message-----
From: web400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:web400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Brad Stone
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2006 2:43 PM
To: Web Enabling the AS400 / iSeries
Subject: Re: [WEB400] AJAX...

On Thu, 21 Sep 2006 11:14:16 -0500
 Robert Cozzi <cozzi@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

In a CGI library the AJAX pieces really need to be sent
as XML. So you need
to build the XML using whatever you want. 

Bob,

I've only used AJAX in a few projects now, but I've always
returned HTML and I am curious as to this statement that it
should be XML.

In fact, I found AJAX was what I've wanted for years.  It's
fairly easy to convert your dymamic SSI to AJAX and make
the pages more seamless (as SSI was the closest to AJAX
that I could get before, and I use it for almost
everything).

AJAX really is just returning data to the page, so making
XML then converting that to HTML really seems like an extra
unneeded step in most web applications, but I am interested
in hearing the whos, whats and whys behind this statement.
 :)

But, I'm shying away from AJAX the more I use it.  It seems
to make debugging and error tracking, not to mention flow a
little more difficult.  But it's still pretty cool.