Web Browser Programming Blurring the Lines of MVC

lkcl tips his in-depth article up at Advogato on the difficulties for the MVC programming model that are introduced by Javascript and AJAX, and solutions for them. He writes: "This article outlines how the MVC concept is made incredibly awkward by the gradual but necessary introduction of Javascript and AJAX. A solution is found in the form of Javascript Compiler Technology such as GWT or Pyjamas (PyPy's JS backend or Rb2Js could be used, with some additional work). The article outlines how and why the traditional MVC patterns are fragmented by Javascript and AJAX, advocating that if a site is programmed purely in a high-level language that is then compiled to Javascript for the Web Browser sections, the same high-level source code can be executed either client-side on the browser, or server-side, or even both, depending on the requirements. The implications of this approach are discussed in depth."

Comments

Re:More Importantly

[MightyMartian]

The semantic web, despite all the nay saying, is here.

And it's a fucking mess.

You know, distributed computing is hardly a new thing, so why is it when the dream of all those researchers a generation ago comes to life, it's in a chaotic, difficult and barely-framework framework like AJAX? It's rather like someone a couple of hundred years ago dreaming of the automobile, but when it's finally developed, it's got two front wheels, two horses legs and the driver faces the wrong way.

History of the Internet (condensed)

[girlintraining]

Call me jaded, old, and behind the times... But what ever happened to a web browser just being a web browser instead of a development platform with three heads breathing fire, half a dozen plugins, six months of combatability testing, and a kitchen sink? Is there ever a point where a web developer will concede that the web is not the Best Platform for Everything in The Universe(tm)? Or is it just that they were never schooled in the old temple and given a proper appreciation of a real language like C++? Help me out here -- this isn't intended as a flame but an honest question -- where does this attitude that everything has to be crowbar'd into a web interface to be considered modern these days? Because a lot of the problems in this article come down to programmers expanding and bloating their platform/language of choice to do something it was never designed for because That's Just What I Know(tm). :( I cry for these languages. I know after 5pm they go home and hit the frozen dairy products hard to feel better about how fat they've become.

Re:History of the Internet (condensed)

[abigor]

It's a common misconception that people are trying to shoehorn everything into browsers. They're not. But it makes sense for certain apps to be centralised, particularly in a corporate/enterprise environment. It's funny, because the successful web apps that are out there (salesforce.com, Taleo, Gmail, etc. etc.) never get picked on - they are just a fact of life now. But when people experiment with new stuff or try to move other apps into a distributed environment, the critics come out of the woodwork.

Also, as a longtime C++ programmer, I can say that C++ is no more a "real" language than Python or Ruby - talk about a juvenile understanding of software development. People use what gets the job done quickly and hopefully with fewer bugs, and when the dust settles certain languages and technologies are shown to work, and others not. But you never know unless you try.

Re:History of the Internet (condensed)

[vux984]

Also, as a longtime C++ programmer, I can say that C++ is no more a "real" language than Python or Ruby

But Javascript or ECMAScript isn't a 'real' language, or at least not in practice, and that's the issue. Code written in it needs to run on multiple different implementations with no properly accepted standards. Contrast that to C, which yeah, has a number of various flavors, but it only matters that you have a compiler that understands that dialect. The stuff you distribute to users isn't going to explode because of your choice of C.

When you write in javascript, you are passing it to end users to interpret with interpreters that you have little control over, interpreters that exist in mutiple versions, have poorly documented quirks, and deviate from the standards wildly in places, with competing implementations and standards. And your code is supposed to run reliably on all of them.

Then add HTML / CSS / XHTML / etc which suffer from the same problems as javascript ... they too have no suitable standards (sure standards exist, but that's more an intellectual point than a useful one). People generate invalid statements left and right, and browsers are supposed to guess how to do things. None of them implement the standards, and all of them have quirks.

People use what gets the job done quickly and hopefully with fewer bugs

Nothing has more bugs than stuff written in the 'web languages'. The current slashdot home page has 91 SGML parser errors and 1 warning, 225 HTMLTidy warnings, and 40 errors via the W3C markup validation service.

and when the dust settles certain languages and technologies are shown to work, and others not. But you never know unless you try.

For what values of 'shown to work' are we interested in? Quality standards and expectations are unbelievably low.

History of the Internet (not even close)

[eldavojohn]

... schooled in the old temple and given a proper appreciation of a real language like C++?

You're going to have to inform us "young'uns" of what is and isn't a "real language." You see, I can't even begin to help you until you concede that if a tool gets the job done, it's a good tool. It might not be the best tool but it's a good tool. Stop making inflammatory statements.

What you misunderstand about this change of direction is that microarchitectures and new hybrids of old design patterns are arising to meet the needs of web developers.

where does this attitude that everything has to be crowbar'd into a web interface to be considered modern these days?

If you write a C++ program and compile it down to one architecture, how many users do you have? If you write a browser, OS, architecture neutral application and make it available to everyone online, your user base skyrockets dramatically.

I cry for these languages.

And these languages cry for you and your closed mindedness towards new ideas. Java was a bad idea at first and yet somehow it has found a niche--more than a niche if you ask me.

I'll meet you half way, I agree C++ is far faster than anything I've been paid to code in. Now you come the other half of the way and maybe we'll have a discussion here where useful information is exchanged.

Not really an MVC problem

[shutdown -p now]

After quickly skimming the article, it seems that the "problem" isn't so much with MVC itself as it is with people not understanding what it is. Apparently, a lot of web developers have thought that "model/controller = server-side, view = client-side". This is obviously wrong, and, of couse, JS and AJAX become extremely confusing to categorize in such a system. No surprise there. Also, article makes a big deal out of the "problem" that JavaScript can be used to work around the requirement that "server generates the view" - but of course, it was never a requirement of MVC, either, and indeed, the original MVC did not imply any sort of "generation" of the views.

Of course, the something-to-JS compilers that are so popular these days won't help, either. JS-the-language is good enough, replacing it with Java (or Python, or Ruby) on the client doesn't really help much, so long as the dividing line between the client and the server remains.