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Microsoft Releases Atlas
Jason Lind writes "Much earlier than anticipated, Microsoft announced the release of Atlas this afternoon at MIX 06. For those who don't know, Atlas is Microsoft's AJAX API for ASP.NET 2, which they claim will greatly reduce the effort in developing AJAX style applications on their platform."
But this is the March CTP for Atlas, not the final release.
ASP.NET 2.0 has a lot more options, including XHTML.
After having watched the guy put together an Ajax application in 10 minutes (typing in all the code right in front of all 1700 of the people in the room) and then watching him open the exact page he created in Safari on a mac, I can pretty well assure you that it DOES work the way MS claims. Now that isn't to say that they haven't built any non-compliant components into it, but what I saw today will handle MOST of the basics of what you'd want on a data driven site without difficulty.
How about we stop trolling and actually check it out before tearing it down.
Well, there's always Javascript Object Notation Language...
Slashdot needs a "-1, Wrong" moderation option.
The Urban Hippie
While I agree that JavaScript is not the ideal candidate for developing any system, much less a web app it is what we are limited to. Java Applets et. al. are DOA, unsupported or don't fit within the model of web application development. For better or worse those are the breaks.
I differ with you on the presumption that AJAX is irrelevant, as recently as a few months ago I would have concurred with this notion and would have agreed that it was a new spin on some simple technologies. That was until I found the Echo2 framework, it is an Open Source Java framework built on top of the servlet API it is the first comprehensive Ajax framework that I have found and the component model is both flexible and intuitive. It is the first framework where I have not felt the restrictions of the web metaphor creeping into design decisions. It has changed my idea of what Ajax web apps are capable of in terms of usability, speed, code reuse and overall system design.
Well, the AJAX wars have started, and M$ maybe just got off the first shot. We'll see. With http://www.morfik.com/'s public beta just around the corner the RAD IDE AJAX tools are finally coming on scene. We'll see what people can do with these tools, and whether AJAX is REALLY as overrated as some are claiming. Personally I'll bet that once people can get their hands on tools that let them build web apps as easily as they can desktop apps (and unplug them, i.e. run them locally or over the 'net, as you can with Morfik) you'll see a huge increase in web applications.
The number of AJAX tools that are on their way is staggering. http://www.tersus.com/ is one designed for the absolute noob, and http://www.backbase.com/ is also a potential option.
Friends help you move. Real friends help you move bodies.
Never forget: 2 + 2 = 5 for extremely large values of 2.
I'm pretty sure the Express Edition just lacks a lot of the server integration/front end deployment capabilities. Which, of course, is a lot.
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Standards Compliant Hmn?
:).
Try the CSS one for a real laugh
My UID is prime. Is yours?
I'm not really a fan of MS, but I recognize they have a lot going for them. I'm a PHP developer so please don't assume I'm defending it because I like ASP. Really, I don't.
I think a bunch of people commenting read the press release and made their judgements without actually investigating how incredible the technology is. There was even the flamebait who posted something about cross browser compatibility. Well, watch the freaking demo video before you go trolling. You can find their first of many such demos here:
mms://wm.microsoft.com/ms/uifx/asp_net_atlas.wmv
Maybe I find it amazing because I'm not that used to ASP development, but I'm thoroughly impressed how far MS has come in making developing for their platform easy. The demo I pasted above shows him making a pretty standard data grid. That part is cool, at best, to anybody familiar with ASP, and flat out amazing to anybody who's never seen ASP sites being developed. About 2/3 into the video he busts out the new Atlas code (so fast forward to there). It was maybe 3 additional ASP tags to implement full asynchronous functionality plus one more to setup a "updating..." dialog. Suddenly, a page that required refreshes on any action could add, edit, and *sort* paginated data without any refreshes.
And then he fires up the same code in Firefox and goes to show that it works exactly the same in both browsers. 3 ASP tags.
I'm sorry, but how can you blindly bash that? Sure there's equivalent technology in the works out there (such as rails), but it doesn't make this any less amazing. If there was a development platform as complete as MS's offering but based on Python/PHP, people would be pissing their pants. To ASP developers, this will make creating AJAX functionality unbelievably easy.
MS just scored major Hype 2.0 points today. But the hype isn't all unjustified. Again, go learn about this before you bash it.
That's a great analogy, but there is one crucial difference between X11 and Javascript: X11 was designed in an academic environment, while JavaScript + AJAX evolved in a de-facto way alongside HTML.
You could write Widgets to run on AJAX just like you could on X11, but it will be really tough since AJAX is not a standard, and it wasn't intended for that purpose. It's just not a solid basis. I'm not saying it won't happen, but it won't be pretty. I'm not sure that such a widget library will ever be truly reliable given the willingness we've seen of browser manufacturers *coughMicrosoftcough* to blatently disregard standards.
see my other post http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=180 799&cid=14959879 it already exits it is called Echo2 it is a open source Java web framework. AJAX is integrated seamlessly into the component model. It is the most comprehensive toolkit I have found. I have been researching them for my new project for several months now and Echo2 is leaps and bounds ahead of the other competing projects.
More likely, the summary is screwed up. It takes you here when you need to go here. I discussed this a bit more in my response to someone else.
This is one of those times that I am actually happy to be wrong. With all the nonsense surrounding AJAX as it is, all we needed was Microsoft throwing fuel on the fire.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
um... in case you haven't noticed, google is updating those images on the fly... which is a textbook definition of how to use ajax...
Here's the site:
http://atlas.asp.net/default.aspx?tabid=47
If your using Java and want a good Ajax framework. Check out Icefaces
It's currently in alpha release.
Lying astroturfer, fraudulently misrepresenting company propaganda as objective third party opinion.
It appears to have been mod'ed up by sock puppets too.
Don't think it's an astroturfer? Learn more about undercover marketing, M$' astroturfing history, non-M$ astroturfing, net astroturfing and non-net astroturfing.
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