.NET and Java (and I bet every modern language) have web services, which basically mean whatever info you can get in a web site can be accessed from a windows app
Sorry but for me, if the loading/rendering time of a web page is noticeable, that can mean two things:
- Its overloaded
- Its bad designed.
Obviously in the case of LFSW the site has TONS of info, first time I saw it I was shocked you could have that in a browser, but as someone already pointed out, its more a windows app playing web site
That said, LFSW its an awesome piece of work from Victor.
I agree with alot of what has been said here. I think the concensus is JS is good when used properly, and its very easy to use it badly. Some general advice could be; only use it when its needed.
Im not sure how useful this conclusion is for you Vic, some ideas will sound great to you, but is it really needed? I think the JS / AJAX sites that excel are the ones that are virtually seemless. As soon as people have to start waiting for something to load, nostalgia about the good old days of plain old html gushes from every exit.
I say leave the luddites to thier slates, go forward with vision and purpose, it is in keeping with the spirit of LFS
Oh and Orion, I love your vision of the future, something to look forward to
Okay, so this is concerning LFSW. I really like LFSW and I think it's a good example of how to successfully use JS.
Normally, from my experience, every attempt to make a website "unique" by inventing a new way of how things work ultimately lead to a failure of that web site. Think of the old flash sites that often were beautifully animated but horrid to use. Alone the thought of a 3D website makes me cringe.
Now, I think LFSW worked out as a website because it effectively cloned a already known-by-the-user concept, namely the desktop. It's behaviour was close enough to the real one, ensuring that the learning curve was very flat. You don't have to think (much) to figure out how to use it, and that made it successful. What I do think though, is, that sometimes finding the information you want isn't that easy, because it's not clear which window contains it. The question you have to ask yourself here is, "what is actually the benefit of using a desktop based system, other than being a nice gimmick?". I don't know any.
Regarding the icons, that may just be me, generally they don't help me at all. There are only very few icons that actually give me information instead of confusing me, or making me think longer of what that pixel mess means than it would take reading the text. On LFSW, pretty much "Settings", "Chatter Box" and "LFS Hotlaps" works for me on the icon side, everything else takes too long to figure out for me (I'm very seldomly using LFSW, tbh). Okay, things like "Messages", "Credit" and "Live Alert" would probably work too, but I never use these features.
So guessing that this all concerns the rewrite of LFSW, please yes, use JS in a nice and browsing-enhancing way. Please do not try to reinvent the wheel with a completely new and neverseen website concept, forcing you to relearn the user interface. Personally I wouldn't mind if you'd ditch the desktop concept and go back to a "normal" but nicely JS enhanced website, but please, as said many times already, if a feature isn't easy to use and immediately understandable, then don't implement it.
As a guy with no programming background, I find the whole conversation little weird, because it asks if I like some programing language. I bet most of the answers are from coders who know their stuff and can present good arguments. However, the rest 90% of us don't really know what's going on.
I can only speak for myself, but websites like lfsw should require no geeky addons to your web browser. I don't care if it uses javascript, java, c++ or basic, what I want is that it works well.
I would personally just continue upgrading and enhancing the current lfsw, instead of making a new one.
Off topic:
No reason for scavier to make an independant lfsw program, easier would be to just add the lfsw functionality into LFS itself. Some of which could be done later anyway...
EDIT: so I voted for the third option, though I really don't know if I should love or hate it
Absolutely. It's a familiar environment - the thing I yearn the most, and really well implemented. It does occasionally cause my IE to crash, but that's an IE problem rather than an LFSW problem.
That's a common misconception from people who don't know the specifics . You cannot throw JavaScript, Java and C++ into one pot. Well maybe Java and C++ as they are similar enough (don't flame me, I mean from a very simplistic point of view), but the only thing JavaScript and Java have in common is the name.
JavaScript is something that every browser nowadays understands and runs. You can do pretty powerful things with it, but the point is, that it runs on the client side (your computer), requiring no client-server communication other than the initial download of the js files. Also you don't need to install any third party apps or runtimes or frameworks or whatever. The other programming languages run on the server and can only be used to dynamically create the HTML content of a page, requiring a full postback (client-server communication) to get new info.
AJAX, fyi, allows the communication between JavaScript and the server, without requiring a full roundtrip. Basically you send a small request to the server and get info back very fast and without the user noticing (white page flicker on clicking a link or doing something).
Anyway, it's a bit hard to explain to someone not knowing the concept, maybe someone else can put it into words better.
Normal webpages are static. For example, you check exchange rates on a normal webpage and it says £1 = $1.78. That's it. You can look at that page all day, and £1 = $1.78 all day, because that's what it was when you hit the page.
AJAX allows it to change, and keep up with what's REALLY happening in the world.. £1 = $1.78; £1 = $1.79; £1 = $1.80; £1 = $1.79.. before your eyes, without having to refresh the page. It doesn't require that horrible refresh click, and reload.. it's like a static page, but one that's alive with real-world activity.
Obviously, in the ever-changing world of LFSW, the benefits of this are obvious
That's obvious, but I was trying to tell was that I really don't know what the exact differences are for javascript and some-other-language and when should one use one or another. From an end user point of view, things should be as simple as possible and should work without any addons to your browser. To achieve this, I don't know (or care) whether javascript should be used or not
I think JS is great... when used properly!
LFSW is aan excellent website and put together very well. i've never had a problem with it on any machine in any browser.
Hi Victor.
I am also a website programmer, like so much people here in this forum, and I know your problem. If one does heavily use JavaScript on his or her sites, he or she has the problem that all the users who do not have a browser of the latest generation and even search engines like google can not view/index the site properly. In my humble opinion, The initial loadup of a page, whether it's design or content, should be done completely without javascript. If you offer the possibility of opening, reloading or updating a page (AJAX), it's important to always have a fallback solution for people without javascript. Yes, it's annoying to have to code things twice or more just because some people think "lol javascript and cookies are bad". But you have to do. A desktop design is of course impossible without Javascript, but I think leaving the desktop design is the logical next step. The site is well designed and its almost barrier-free, but with the look and feel of a desktop Google will not even once think of indexing it properly.
BTT: I voted for 1. Javascript is not bad, as many people think. Javascript and Cookies are 2 things that have a bad image just because some magazines printed somethink without proper research. Cookies have a bad image because an american computer magazine once, in the mid-90s, printed that webservers could read files from your computer. In fact they cant randomly select files they want to read from your PC. They cant even read the cookies they set earlier. The cookies are sent back to the server in a request-header, and the magazine printed wrong things. They wrote a correction in the next issue because they recognized the error they made, but it was simply silenced to death. And because JavaScript can read and set cookies, It was called bad once it was out.
Oh, one thing I forgot: @Becky Rose and all the others that cant see the difference between Java and JavaScript:
They are two entirely different things.
Java is a programming language that creates a intermediate language when compiled, so people have to get the Java Plugin from Sun Microsystems to use all these nice Java Applications.
JavaScript is a client-side scripting language that comes in with all modern browsers. You do not need any extra plugin to use it, and everyone who once surfed LFSW can tell all the good things JavaScript can do. JavaScript can be simply embedded into websites using *.js-files.
We are talking about JavaScript here. It has nothing to do with Java except a part of the name and some similarities in Programming Style.
@Vic: We have a percentage of 70% who use javascript to 30% who dont. Follow the majority. In my opinion, You should use JavaScript to make the sites more useful. You should heavily use it. But please always offer a fallback solution for all those who dont have a modern browser and for these nerds that can not stop thinkin "oh JS is bad".
These were my :twocents:, thanks for reading them.
Is there really any must have need to use JS at all on a website?
I try to keep the page weight down to a minimum cause there are lots of ppl out there who still have dial up. So rarely use any JS stuff. I don't use JS menus much unless the client wants one.
Obviously Victor wants some feedback on his implementation of the LFSW website; apart from slow loadtimes and no proper doctype declaration which forces IE into the dreaded "quirks" mode. The site has merits and is an attempt at innovation.
I don't like all the icons when a simple graphical menu or css based menu would do the same, but that's a personal preference.
The site does what it's supposed to do, nothing more, nothing less, as a work of art? Perhaps to some, as a great piece of JS programming?
I'm not qualified enough in JS to comment, however, I'm sure there has been a huge amount of time spent on the development of the site to get it to where it is in functionality.
JS is much like flash based sites, there are some incredibly detailed and innovative Flash sites out there, but they're often built at the cost of load times and in the case of Flash, are more a showpiece for the designer, "who shouts, Look at me, I'm the greatest"
Fortunately, Victor has put functionality into the site and doesn't claim to have an ego, Let's ask Victor to design a non JS based site to do the same thing, and we'll find it will load faster, perform better and take about 4 hrs to develop. Not to mention if ppl have JS disabled the site will still work.
So in terms of development time, JS adds many hours, has the potentional for syntax errors. (how many times have I put a , instead of . etc) and probably requires more planning, testing and debugging
Well, XHTML 1.0 is limited in many ways, just think about basic things like vertical align. Thus one cant really realize such a complex layout in XHTML 1.0. You need Transitional 4.01, which will trigger quirks mode anyway
The doctype and even more content type (charset) are very important though.
ORION, vertical align can also be set up via css. the reasen why xhtml is here is to make it a markup language again - nothing more, nothing less. things like valign="", <sup> or <strong> are tags that are there just to define how the text looks like - what can of course be better done with CSS.
According to The Counter, only 6% of users have JavaScript off. Subtract from that the nerds who are willing to turn it on just for LFSW, and the page hits from non-PC visitors (search engine crawlers, PDAs), and you have an overwhelming majority that has JS on. In fact, so big that you might not even need a real fallback for non-JS users, but a simple message like "This site requires JS".
Hmmm 102 votes, that isnt really representative is it?
What are your plans vic?
@Stalker:
show me the code
The is no reliable cross-browser way to implement v-align via CSS in XHTML. There are many different approaches, but the only one that works on all browsers is a crappy hack which will only work for basic content of the centered div. Put an iframe in it and it's cut in the middle in IE6.
Additionally I have not tested anything in IE7, which might be a struggle aswell...
Im talking about a solid v-align that will not require new hacks for each little browser update. Afaik, this doesnt exist in XHTML. I'd be glad if you have some magic code though
That's a common misconception from people who don't know the specifics 