What I’m sick of…
by Administrator
It seems that at least once a day I talk to someone on the phone or I read an article written by some editor (e.g. not someone technical) that talks about ‘how cool Ajax is’. They say things like “…with new software products like Ajax, sites are able to build better experiences.” Or I’ll hear things like “that site was developed in either Ajax or Rails which gives it that cool look”.
If someone isn’t butchering Ajax its probably because they are too busy misappropriating Ruby on Rails for some sentence where the term just doesn’t belong. I don’t think a person has to be technical to go and spend a little time trying to figure out what technologies are used for. You don’t have to know how to write applications that leverage Rails. You don’t have to even know how to write a single bit of HTML. But it sure would be nice if people could at least use these technologies correctly in a sentence. Is that too much to ask?
What’s happening here is a little bit of web 2.0 froth that’s boiled over and now we’re all speaking tech ebonics.
Comments
Kelly, I agree. Further, what irritates me is the fact that technologies like Ajax are not altogether new. XMLHttp has been built in for some time, and creating interesting effects with JavaScript have gone unnoticed (rightfully so) even longer.
It’s a shame that buzzwords like Ajax and Web 2.0 bring attention to areas of Web technology that should be transparent to the user. Isn’t an objective of our “new” Interweb to provide better and better services/experiences to our users? Have people stopped reading Jakob Neilsen, Steve Krug, E.B. White?
There’s nothing wrong with Ruby, or Rails, or even grouping JavaScript/XML into the title of Ajax (it’s handy), but they’re no different than PERL or any other scripting language. Each has their whiz-bang features but there’s no need to make scripting the next media darling. What I see as a result is overuse, misuse, and misrepresentation (“tech ebonics”) of what should otherwise be hidden behind their results – well formed presentation and operation layers.
I mention Ajax in regards to OSNAP.net – there’s opportunity to use the scripting for better display. However, I’m not about to label my project(s) with “Now with Ajax!” I’d rather label my projects as being engaging, easy to use, and the best method to reach a positive result – my project itself is the media darling, not the ingredients.
Thanks Chad. You are so right. I do see people say or imply things like “Now with Ajax” and it makes me think of silly ad tactics that you might see on laundry detergent boxes or cans of soup. “Now with more chicken flavor…tastes more like real animals.”
Ack.
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