Beginning Ajax
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Ajax is often mistaken for a programming language, when in reality it is more of a standard or technique used to create better, more interactive web applications. It is used to create more responsive web pages by loading certain areas of a page, instead of an entire page. In this tutorial, and the ones that follow, we will learn to work with it to build dynamic web sites.
Ajax is an acronym that stands for Asynchronous Javascript and XML. It work across a multitude of platforms and is compatible with all of the major browsers. The "asynchronous" portion of its name comes from its ability to request data from the server using the XMLHttpRequest Object and store it in the background without changing the appearance or behavior of the page.
Typically JavaScript is used to make the Ajax function calls. For browsers that do not support XMLHttpRequests, remote scripting can be used.
In this article we will learn the basics of this technique, along with its history. I will make some assumptions. I will assume that you have some knowledge of HTML or XHTML and JavaScript. An understanding of other web technologies, such as XML and CSS would also be helpful. I add CSS in that mix because CSS is also part of the standard that comprises the makeup of Ajax.
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