Visual QuickStart Guide: JavaScript, Ninth Edition

13. Introducing Ajax

In This Chapter

Ajax: Pinning It Down

Reading Server Data

Parsing Server Data

Refreshing Server Data

Getting Data From a Server

Previewing Links with Ajax

Auto-Completing Form Fields

Checking Whether a File Exists

The web is always changing, and for web and JavaScript developers the ground shifted under their feet beginning in early 2005. New and immediately popular web applications appeared, some of them from Google, such as Gmail and Google Maps, and some from others, such as Flickr. The common denominator of all of these sites was that they acted more like desktop applications, with fast, responsive user interfaces. Instead of the traditional web application—where the user clicked, waited some number of seconds for the ...