Mastering AJAX Techniques

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Course Catalog

Duration: 5 Days

Audience

Prerequisites

This course is designed for Web application developers and professionals:

Architects
Designers
Consultants
Developers
Technical managers

Description

If you are used to some of the newer Web 2.0 sites like Google maps, Yahoo mail, etc., you must have noticed the slick UI features like dynamic page refreshing, drag and drop, etc. What is happening behind the scenes is a new way of building Web applications that has taken the internet by storm. AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) capitalizes on the browser's ability to asynchronously communicate with the web server simply by building on existing JavaScript and XML technologies.

We start the course with an in-depth coverage of JavaScript and CSS. This will lead into the introduction of AJAX fundamentals. After looking at how AJAX works, this course will cover the techniques, frameworks, and tools that help build professional AJAX-based Web applications. More than 60% of the time will be spent on hands-on labs. We will discuss both the client-side and server-side technologies involved.

This course looks at several popular toolkits and frameworks, including Prototype, Dojo, YUI, JSON-RPC for Java, DWR (Direct Web Remoting), GWT (Google Web Toolkit), etc. to build AJAX applications.

Objectives

This course aims to teach a set of advanced skills for implementing practical, industrial-strength AJAX solutions. On completion, attendees would be able to:

Get a working knowledge of JavaScript fundamentals
Get familiar with Cascading Style Sheets usage
Understand how AJAX works
Use basic AJAX techniques to build a better web user experience
Use Prototype, Dojo and YUI library components
Understand what server-side AJAX frameworks are
Discover some of the popular server-side AJAX frameworks
Compare and contrast between XML and JSON data types
Use the JSON-RPC-Java bridge to build and invoke server-side Java components
Use the DWR framework to allow Javascript in a browser to interact with Java on a server
Use Google Web Toolkit (GWT) to write both client and server-side components in Java

Course Outline

Introducing AJAX

Life Before AJAX
What, Why and How of AJAX
Overview of DOM
Your first AJAX application

JavaScript Basics

Adding JavaScript to HTML
Data types, Operators, Control Structures
Functions, Methods, and Events
Throw, Try...Catch Exceptions
Objects
Browser Object Model, Document Object Model
Regular Expressions
Client-side Validation

Advanced JavaScript

Interactive Forms and Verifying Form Data
Targeting Frames and Windows with JavaScript
Cookies and JavaScript Security
Custom JavaScript Objects
Prototype and Object Inheritance
Closures in JavaScript
Debugging JavaScript
CSS Basics

Basic AJAX Techniques

XMLHttpRequest
Browser Compatibility
Asynchronous Invocation
Handling XML
DOM APIs: Nodes, Methods
InnerHTML
A Complete AJAX Example

Data Formats for AJAX

XML, the Benefits
SOA: XML is Everywhere
XML Shortcomings
JSON Data Types
JSON Strings, Numbers, Arrays
JSON Objects
JSON and JavaScript

The Prototype Toolkit

Shortcut Functions
String Utilities
Collections
Ajax Objects: Request, Updater, PeriodicUpdater

The YUI Toolkit

Using YUI
Head first YUI Example
Event Utility
Element Utility
Widgets: Buttons, Menu, Forms
Connection Manager
The YUI Compressor

The Dojo Toolkit

Dojo Overview
Dojo Event Model
Dijits
Form Widgets
Control Widgets
Layout Widgets
XHR Handlers
Dojo and JSON
Dojo Data Stores

Overview of Server-Side AJAX Frameworks

Serving AJAX Content from the Server
Redistributing MVC Across the Tiers
Popular Server-side AJAX frameworks

Web Protocols for AJAX

Web services and SOA
REST: A lightweight Web service solution
Introducing Comet
Comet: Streaming and Long Polling
The Bayeux protocol
Bayeux protocol handshake, events
Bayeux connection and subscription
Web feeds: RSS and ATOM

JSON-RPC for Java

How does JSON-RPC-Java work
JSONRPCBridge and Global bridge
JSONRPCServlet
Type mapping
JavaScript client

Direct Web Remoting

How does DWR work
Setting up web.xml and dwr.xml
Callback methods
Scripting with generated JavaScript
Integration with servlet, Struts, etc.
Error handling
Security issues with DWR

Google Web Toolkit

How does GWT work?
GWT compiler
Hosted and Web Modes
Client-side and Server-side code
Modules
Building user interfaces with GWT
Remote Procedure Call in GWT

AJAX Security

The Browser Sandbox
The Vulnerabilities
Javascript Injections: XSS, CSRF
SQL Injections
Client-side v.s. Server-side Validation
Tips and Best practices

Advanced Concepts

Some Design Patterns and Anti-patterns
Case Studies
Thoughts on Performance Issues


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