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HTML5 App For Panasonic TVs Rejected - JQuery Is a "Hack"
An anonymous reader writes "I have been working on an HTML5 app for Panasonic VIERA TVs, specifically a client for the Plex Media Server. After paying $129 for the developer program, version 1.0 was submitted for inclusion in their VIERA Connect marketplace several weeks ago. After a few requested tweaks, they inquired about how the client communicated with the Plex Server. As many/most web developers do, I used jQuery and its $.ajax call (which is just a wrapper for XMLHttpRequest()). They insisted this was not standard Javascript, and after several communications with them, they replied back with "A workaround like this is considered a hack.". I'm stunned that anyone familiar with HTML would consider jQuery a hack. I've been patient in attempting to explain how jQuery works, but I am getting nowhere. Any thoughts on how I can better explain jQuery to an app reviewer? Yes, I know I can write my app without any Javascript library, but I am really hoping avoid that."
Fuck Beta twice for more modpoints!!
I've been a Slashdot user since 2007. My username is JoshuaZ ID# 1134087. I strongly dislike the beta version. The large default font makes less on a page at any given time. The comment handling is inferior and is harder to follow. It makes it much harder to just see upvoted comments instead subjecting us to the entire thread. I don't want a choice between "all" and insightful, informative or funny. I want an option to just see the more upvoted comments with the other comments still there with their subject lines so I can then decide based on that if they are worth looking into.
The userpage interfact and display is also lacking. The new version of the achievement display is strictly inferior since it doesn't show when things happened or give any information about the achievements instead giving cutesy graphics that tell nothing about what an achievement is for. Even knowing what achievements are common, I had to use the inspect element feature on my browser to figure out which is which. Comments in the user page also don't show how much they have been upvoted or downvoted nor do they give their description of how they've been modded. There's also no way to just go directly from a comment on the userpage to the comment on the article page, but instead the link takes one directly to the top of the article. This means that if one wants to find the context of a comment one needs to go to the main article and then search for the comment itself. This is inconvenient.
Overall, beta has many minor inconveniences. Any of these by itself would be minor but the totality is highly unpleasant. All of these should be fixed.
Now that I've had even more experience with beta I'd have other fun things to add to that email. I'm not optimistic that any of this feedback is going to be listened to.
I agree 100% The new design offers NOTHING. It is utterly soulless and spaces everything out requiring more and more fucking scrolling. Which is what seems to be the damn trend.
FUCK BETA
Inline it (jQuery).
When they ask how it communicates, tell them how, not what functions/callbacks you use in your code.
Ex. The server communicates using the standard Plex web API (or whatever it's called), documented _here_. The RCP calls are made using the standard XMLHttpRequest, with wrappers to ensure compatibility with the evolving web browser landscape. yada yada yada.
I'm sure it's a PITA, but I get the feeling the submitter said too much - explaining how jQuery internals work is going to seem like an over complicated nightmare. If they specifically ask about that weird looking "$.ajax" stuff, just tell them it is a simple wrapper that compensates for the subtle differences in XMLHttpRequest implementations. If the code finally gets to someone that can read it, they'll probably be quite familiar with jQuery and quite happy you are using it than some custom cobbled together hack :-)
If a large population likes it the way it is, that is valid feedback. It means don't change. Keeping things the way they are is a perfectly good, and frequently the best design decision.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
The beta doesn't add any useful new features. All it does is remove them and severely fucks up the best part of this site: the commenting and moderation system. If the commenting system goes out the window, why would I come here? The stories are always several days or a week old, the editors are terrible at their job, and all of the actual articles are on other sites I could browse instead.
What the hell, Dice?
The best thing about UDP jokes is I don't care if you get them or not