AJAX and Reporting. What Is AJAX? AJAX, short
for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML, refers to a technology approach or development technique for
creating interactive Web applications and improving the user experience. The intent of AJAX is to make
Web pages more interactive and more responsive, and the entire Web page does not have to be reloaded
each time the user makes a change. AJAX is open and has platform independence. The Web technologies
that make up AJAX include XHTML and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) for standards-based presentation,
JavaScript, and XML, among others.
Google Maps, http://maps.google.com/, is a great example of a rich, interactive Web application, which employs AJAX to deliver a purely Web-based application. There is no footprint, and no downloads or installation are required. As a user, you can just run the application in your browser from your Mac, your PC, or your Linux computer. Google has also adopted this technology for their popular Web-based Gmail and Google Spreadsheets applications, among others.
The intent of AJAX is to make Web pages more interactive and more responsive, and the entire Web page does not have to be reloaded each time the user makes a change. AJAX is open and has platform independence. The Web technologies that make up AJAX include XHTML and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) for standards-based presentation, JavaScript, and XML, among others.
AJAX applications do not require the user to download plug-ins; they work directly with the Web browser. An AJAX engine sits between the browser and server from which it requests information. Instead of loading a Web page, the browser loads the AJAX engine, which displays the page the user sees. This engine runs in the background and uses JavaScript to communicate with the Web browser. Any user interactions or requests send JavaScript to the AJAX engine, which responds instantly. If it needs more data, it sends a request using XML to the server and simultaneously updates the page.