Toluu

Ajaxian

Cleaning up the web with Ajax

iPod Engraving Gallery and Leopard.Next DHTMLToday

I noticed the new iPod Engraving Gallery that is a nice use of Coherent to show a slick UI with engraving suggestions.

I was also talking to a friend that has leopard beta bits and he was playing with an updated Dashcode. It appears that the Coherent library is now used for the widgets too. Yay data binding!

AbstractCanvas: HTML Canvas and Java2D in one fell swoopToday

Rodrigo Reyes has announced a new project called AbstractCanvas, a GWT project that sits on top of HTML Canvas and Java2D.

The same code can thus run in the browser, or on the server.

You can then write code such as:

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

1.  
2.  VerticalPanel vPanel = new VerticalPanel();
3.  
4.  CanvasPanelExt canvas1 = new CanvasPanelExt(300,150);
5.  
6.  canvas1.setFillStyle(Color.WHITE);
7.  canvas1.setGlobalAlpha(1.0);
8.  canvas1.fillRect(0, 0, canvas1.getCoordWidth(

Kojax? Huh?Today

Mary Jo Foley has an article called Move over, Ajax. Here comes Microsoft’s ‘Kojax’. The thing is, I don't get what it actually is:

Kojax is a mobile development platform, according to my sources, that will allow Microsoft- — and third-party-developed — applets run in an Ajax-like way, using a combination of Visual Studio tools and JavaScript, on Java-based mobile phones.

Erm, is this just JavaScript running on the JVM? This is the big deal instead of the PDC touted "write using .NET and deploy everywhere"?

Mary goes on:

What kinds of mobile applets are we talking about here? Nothing iPhone-like, such as restaurant reviews or “I am Rich.” More like a virtual wallet for online payments, a group messaging service and photo-sharing app — things that build on top of Windows Live for Mobile services. Some of these Kojax-based applets will ad-funded; others will likely be transaction- and subscription-based.

Another interesting part of the Kojax tips I’ve received: Microsoft allegedly is aiming its Kojax applet plans primarily at users in emerging markets.

The Kojax work may or may not be related to a recent Unlimited Potential initiative about which I recently heard, known as “Mobile First.” Mobile First is all about users whose first Microsoft-related experience tends to be in the mobile-phone, rather than the PC, realm.

Chromium Extensions Design DocToday

Aaron Boodman posted about the new design document that discusses what the extension system should look like in Chromium and thus Google Chrome:

Chromium can't be everything to all people. People use web browsers in a variety of environments and for a wide variety of jobs. Personal tastes and needs vary widely from one user to the next. The feature needs of one person often conflict directly with those of another. Further, one of the design goals of Chromium is to have a minimal light-weight user interface, which itself conflicts with adding lots of features.

User-created extensions have been proposed to solve these problems:

• The addition of features that have specific or limited appeal ("that would be great as an extension").
• Users coming from other browsers who are used to certain extensions that they can't live without.
• Bundling partners who would like to add features to Chromium specific to their bundle.

They then define the goals:

An extension system for Chromium should be:

• Webby

• Developing and using extensions should be very similar to developing and using web pages.
• We should reuse the web platform wherever possible instead of creating new proprietary API

JavaScript Bra Size CalculatorNovember 28

Now this could only fly on a Friday ;)

Ed Spencer has coded up a bra size calculator in JavaScript:

One of the more mesmerizing websites I've worked on recently was for a lingerie boutique in the UK. Aside from the unenviable task of having to look at pictures of women in lingerie all day, I was also forced (forced!) to write a bra size calculator.

The theory behind bra size calculation is arcane and somewhat magical. Understanding of it does not come easily to man nor beast, so it is lucky that I, falling cleanly into neither category, have passed through pain and torment to save you the trouble.

After hours of testing he came up with the BraCalculator:

PLAIN TEXT

JAVASCRIPT:

1.  
2. var BraCalculator = {
3.  
4.   /**
5.    * The string to be returned when the result could not be calculated.  Overwrite to change this
6.    */
7.   unknownString: "Unknown",
8.  
9.   cupSizes: ["A", "B", "C", "D",