Ajax and Mambo?

[cozimek]

Hey everyone,

Well, we're here in DC always trying to think of ways to push the Mambo envelope. To really make Mambo an application that is both detailed and sleek.

We've been reading more about xmlhttprequest and Ajax. One of the fellas over at Adaptive Path wrote a great article about Ajax, which I highly recommend that the dev team read.

Essentially, the core system that Mambo is running on doesn't have much of a future to it. Not that the concept, the hardwork, and the code is necessarily bad, but it's going to be "old school" within the next year as xmlhttprequest and Ajax systems start taking effect.

What's the goal? To make the user seemingly feel that the system isn't running on some far away server, that requires a full page reload just to view a new category of items. The goal is to bring javascript back into action, having it run as a little engine behind the front-end that would allow simple actions to happen without full page refreshes. Look at Google Maps. That's the future.

Anyone thinking about this for the 5.0 release of Mambo?

-Ryan

[MasterChief]

What is it with the Ajax dejavu at the moment Funny how stuff comes in globs. First red flag I see is the browser compat (technology is absolutely great though).

There is also another project that looks interesting here but it seems to be inactive:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/postofficebox/

I am very keen to get this technology into Mambo to solve a few scaling problems.

[tonyskyday]

It is funny to see this become the sudden buzz-word, even though it's been around for a little while. I guess once Google started using it everywhere, it got people's attention.

Anyway, found this link on kottke.org today, looks to be an active project: http://www.modernmethod.com/sajax/

[intel352]

there are supposedly a number of ways to blend technologies to achieve the AJAX method. it's not just javascript+xml, but that's the most popular method currently (apparently)

and yeah, i've read that AJAX has been around quite awhile, but hasn't been used very much due to how difficult it is to implement (much longer dev period)

EDIT: wow, that SAJAX toolkit looks pretty nifty :-)

[bigodines]

Ajax is really cool! It would be great to see mambo using this tecnology.

[ratlaw]

I'm in the process of writing up my proposal for "Summer of Code" and it could provide a hook for an AJAX type intergation with out any great change to the current core.

Heres hoping

[ganar]

I read the articles and visited the site...

We were trying to pull this out in 1998-99 and had to abandon the approach due to the state of the browsers at the time. We end up using some of the benefits of AJAX in intranet work were we could stablish the browser version to be used among many other variables.

Now comes AJAX and I can see that it would be great to implement in the administration side of Mambo, were it would have a great impact in the way the admin is used on a day to day basis.

I can also see AJAX applied to components like Calendars events, Docman and maybe – by a long shot – com_frontpage.

I feel that the AJAX aproach is very good for web applications but not for content, due to the way the browsers are working at the moment and how hard it is still to get propper positioning in html and xhtml among different browsers.

Another aspects to take care off before thinking about AJAX for com_content is the fact that the separation between content and structure is very thin indeed... The structure of a page gives meaning to the content. Graphic Design as a discipline has been working around this since the very beggining, building succesfull products around this concept. I don't think that a web App look is the correct way to display content... It's been tryed in flash and other technologies and I still prefer to see a propperly designed page than a "content reader" with text and pictures out of context...

I feel that the next version of Mambo and com_content should consider the concept of "content_templates" small subtemplates to arrange content inside Mambo's content area. We should be able to use more than one of this building blocks on a given page. I feel that Pat template can allow this to happen, that the only thing neccesary would be a way to make , store and use this subtemplate concept in the com_content interface . AJAX would be great for this...

What do you think?

[Jinx]

Ganar,

For 4.5.3, we are adding a small javascript behavior library to the administrator. The idea is to add better interactive behavior and slowly move the backend's mental model from a website concept to a RIA (rich internet application). AJAX is also something on our wishlist.

The primary goal is to add this behavior in a unobstrusive way, relying on the actual structure of the page and not like for example Gmail, BackPack etc. On the long run the adminustrator will keep using a push webmodel, AJAX and js will only be used the enchange it.

[ganar]

I feel that the admin is an excelent place to start. Many of the AJAX concepts can be implemented in the template level at least in the beggining.

We manage a site with daily updates and we have noticed that each new version of mambo has a heavier and slower backend interface. Don't get me wrong : the new features are great, the problem is that in places were the internet connection is not very good it takes a long time to do anything in it.

I can envision the admin of com_content as an AJAX application pulling information from places like the menu, the template manager and the media manager, a new system to assign subtemplates in the content and seamless integration with the content list among other things... All of this done as interfase plugins for this App. In the end it would feel a little bit like gmail wich is quite fast. All of this would mean a huge effort, but maybe the existing Lybraries in the AJAX project can help to solve the issues regarding compatibility among different browsers and operating systems

[ganar]

http://sean.treadway.info/demo/upload

The page that spawn this link is this: http://www.adaptivepath.com/publicat...ves/000430.php


I feel that they may be on to something here...

[eyezberg]

Good article about AJAX and the back button: how not to break this commonly used navigation.

http://www.contentwithstyle.co.uk/Ar...-for-ajax-apps

[stingrey]

Originally Posted by ganar

Another aspects to take care off before thinking about AJAX for com_content is the fact that the separation between content and structure is very thin indeed... The structure of a page gives meaning to the content....

I feel that the next version of Mambo and com_content should consider the concept of "content_templates" small subtemplates to arrange content inside Mambo's content area. We should be able to use more than one of this building blocks on a given page. I feel that Pat template can allow this to happen, that the only thing neccesary would be a way to make , store and use this subtemplate concept in the com_content interface .

Yes we agree and the conversion to the use of patTemplates is slowly happening. Already in 4.5.3 CVS Core modules are using patTemplates to generate the code.

[Gayle]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jinx

Ganar,

For 4.5.3, we are adding a small javascript behavior library to the administrator. The idea is to add better interactive behavior and slowly move the backend's mental model from a website concept to a RIA (rich internet application). AJAX is also something on our wishlist.

The primary goal is to add this behavior in a unobstrusive way, relying on the actual structure of the page and not like for example Gmail, BackPack etc. On the long run the adminustrator will keep using a push webmodel, AJAX and js will only be used the enchange it.

I only discovered this thread after doing this, is it worth me taking a look at the 4.5.3 CVS if I do any more playing along these lines?

[Jinx]

Originally Posted by ganar

We manage a site with daily updates and we have noticed that each new version of mambo has a heavier and slower backend interface. Don't get me wrong : the new features are great, the problem is that in places were the internet connection is not very good it takes a long time to do anything in it.

We are aware of this and are looking at ways to make it less heavy. AJAX could help here by reducing the full page reload on certain functionality.

[Jinx]

Originally Posted by Gayle

I only discovered this thread after doing this, is it worth me taking a look at the 4.5.3 CVS if I do any more playing along these lines?

Gayle, AJAX is not yet implemented but i'm slowly moving towards it. Currently u will already find a small javascript behavior library in the 4.5.3 CVS. Here are a few links to AJAX libraries :

• SAJAX : http://www.modernmethod.com/sajax/download.phtml (version 0.10)
• JPSPAN : http://jpspan.sourceforge.net/wiki/doku.php
• Celini : http://op-en.org/ (not yet released)
• Prototype : http://prototype.conio.net/
  

[eyezberg]

From Alex Bosworth(full article)

1. Not giving immediate visual cues for clicking widgets.
2. Breaking the back button
3. Changing state with links (GET requests)
4. Blinking and changing parts of the page unexpectedly
5. Not using links I can pass to friends or bookmark
6. Too much code makes the browser slow
7. Inventing new UI conventions
8. Not cascading local changes to other parts of the page
9. Asynchronously performing batch operations
10. Scrolling the page and making me lose my place

[<--R O B-->]

good points - here's how I'd respond to them if impletement ajax work in mambo:

1. This is simply poor design, how does this apply specifically to ajax?

2. Hehe - mambo already suffers from this - as it leaves your articles checked in if you press the back button when editing an article.

3. I'm not sure that you'd need to worry about what robots do in the backend, and I'm unconvinced about his arguement: "users who are accustomed to having links drive navigation can become confused when links are used to drive application state changes"
surely page navigation IS state change? - and if visual feedback is given from your app then what's the issue?

4.Again surely a question of good design/bad design not simply a ajax mistake?

5. This doesnt apply to mambo afaict, certainly not in the administration

6. Not used enough ajax apps to have noticed speed problems, google maps works well for me and I'm using a 4 year old laptop (with about 10 other apps constantly running).

7-10 again simply (or not so simply ) a question of good interface design /HCI design.

[eyezberg]

I do have some bookmarks in Mambo admin (pt 5): login, then click bookmark, instead of modules/site modules/latest referers (need to ban spaminators often..)

[<--R O B-->]

cool - never though about doing that

[Jinx]

These are all good points, however we are talking about using AJAX in the backend and not for the fun of it but to improve usability and workflow. Like ROB points out alot of the remarks don't related to our administrtor section.

1. I think we are doing a good job here

2. Will be fixed in 4.5.3

3. (see Rob's note)

4. This is beyond Mambo scope, the AJAX implementation will be built ontop and only take care of smaller tasks. For example, publish without page refresh etc ...

6. I'm working on speed improvements for the administrator.