AJAX: Poster child and metaphore for Web 2.0

Peter Coffee wrote a nice article about AJAX and how it is not the pancea for web services that so many flock to.

It occured to me after reading that article that if you replace AJAX with Web 2.0 and then replace the various AJAX technologies with Web 2.0 technologies, that the article could just as easily be about Web 2.0. Go figure.

I especially like the ending paragraph:

Google's high profile has contributed to an aura of fairy dust surrounding AJAX, making it seem both more powerful and less risky than it may prove to be in the hands of any but the most talented developers. But as Sophocles wrote in 440 B.C., "Ever do I behold thee scheming to snatch some vantage o'er thy foes. Skilled in the chase thou seemest. Say what eager quest is thine, that I who know may give thee light." That's Athena's opening speech in the classic play "Ajax."

One of Mr. Coffee's points is that AJAX is not for the faint-of-heart, which I agree with. I remember writing an AJAX grid control for a time and materials entry page sometime in 1998. I was amazed at what could be done with DHTML and XML RPC. But, I left the company before I finished the grid control and no one else at the company could finish it so they tossed it and used boring old HTML Forms. It was some of the trickiest and harriest and ugliest bits of code I've ever written.

Just say no to AJAX and say hello to UIEngine :)