tedd wrote:
Another way of asking this question is, "Besides not triggering a refresh, what can ajax do that php can not?"
PHP cannot control the browser presentation, it can merely provide static information to the browser. Javascript can control the browser presentation, and it can be generated by PHP AJAX merely allows you to combine the functionality of javascript with the dynamic data access of PHP(or any other CGI script) in order to put the two together in a more dynamic fashion. It has sparked some innovations in presenting and packaging data generated by CGI that than make the whole thing reusable(for example, frameworks which pull all the dynamic data down to the server and then allow one to work offline and then sync up to the server. Of course, the curmudgeon in me would say "well, besides using a web browser, what can this do that a Lotus Notes client can't? " :-0 and the answer is it can be done without charging hundreds of dollars per user.)
I see web browser applications slowly approaching the full power of a Notes Application from over 5 years ago. But they do it in a cross platform, affordable manner. Still, with notes I knew precisely what functions would work on every system with a notes client plus had certain levels of security unavailable with a browser without a lot of work, so it has it's place in the corporate environment.
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