Gadgetopia

Ajax-ified Weblog: This is a neat example of Ajax-ifying Movable Type comments.

if you try to submit a comment now, the form fields will go “dark”, and you’ll see a progress bar as your info is sent to the server. When the server gets the data and processes it, it sends the properly formatted comment back to the page, which plops it into place under the others.

There are a ton of test comments from people wanting to see it in action, so don’t be shy — add your own. It works well. (NOTE: Not on this entry. Follow the link above.)

However, I always wonder…why? Where is the line between traditional Web development and Ajax? At what point do you look at an operation and say, “That needs to be done without reloading the page.”

I’ve talked before about the usability implications of Ajax, but in this case, I’m just wondering what the reasoning was to implement it this way and not the “normal” way. Is there an un-written set of guidelines that people are using to decide whether or not to Ajax something?