Shedding some light on Javascript
What is Javascript?
It's an object-based programming language that is NOT Java. It was developed at Netscape and then handed over to the ECMA and thus is sometimes refered to as ECMAScript
The bottom line on usability:
Using noscript is easy enough, but beware of firewalls that block javascript when javascript is actually turned on in the browser. If it's essential that all users use the content in Javascript, give them another way.
More on Usability:
Here's something cool you can do with Javascript from Explorit Science Center in Davis, California:
If it works, you'll get the following message at the top of your screen
If you have it turned off (or any number of problems, including firewall blockage), then you don't get the message. It's not that important here, but Roger Johansson of 456bereastreet.com gives three pertinent examples of when having JavaScript turned off could be hurtful.
In order for everyone to reading to know a little about how JavaScript works in HTML here's a code example borrowed from Sarah Carrier:
<script type="text/javascript">
//<![CDATA[
... The script is placed here ...
//]]
</script>
Users might experience problems if they have JavaScript turned off. It's pretty easy to do. Just uncheck a box in Firefox:
REFERENCES
Websites
Unobtrusive JavaScript [Internet]. Carrier, S; c2007 [cited 2007 May 1]. Available from
http://www.ils.unc.edu/~scarrier/inls572/final/Sarah is a classmate of mine and her project ties in to my discussion on JavaScript. In fact, since she's focused on a specific web technology rather than discussing things more generally, she has a lot more information on JavaScript than I do!
You cannot rely on JavaScript being available. Period. [Internet]. Johansson, R; c2006 [cited 2007 May 1]. Available from
http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200612/you_cannot_rely_on_javascript_being_available_period/
An awesome article on JavaScript written by a Swede. Viva la Sweden! Like many web articles, the comments are often as insightful as the original post, plus the commenters can say things that the article writer (or blogger, but what's the difference...) cannot say either for either legal or professional reasons. Commenters typically do not have to identify themselves with more than a username and e-mail address, which might mean they do not know anything, but typically people reading articles on Javascript know something about Javascript or are trying to learn. The point is, these types of sites are not invested with 13-year-olds and they typical do not have the type of flaming/trolling that a political site might have. This site is nice because they have a handy high-contrast style (think the blue background that Microsoft Word offers) at the click of a button for those of us that spend way too much time reading stuff off of computer screens. I love this quote
"A modern web browser like Firefox, Safari or Opera is needed to make the most out of this site, but thanks to the separation of content and presentation it should be accessible to any browsing device, including Internet Explorer."
Books
Robbins JN. 2006. Web design in a nutshell, third editition. Sebastopol, CA: O'Reilly Media, Inc. 796 p.
Wilton P. 2004. Beginning Javascript, 2nd Edition. Indianapolis, IN: Wiley Publishing. 1010 p.
Goodman, Danny. Dynamic HTML: The Definitive Reference. O'Reilly (1998).
Recommending by Lerner in his "At the Forge" article.
Keith, Jeremy. DOM Scripting: Unobtrusive JavaScript at Its Best. Friends if ED (2005).
Langridge, Stuart. DHTML Utopia: Modern Web Design Using JavaScript & DOM. sitepoint (2005).
Scholarly Articles
Lerner RM. 2006. At the forge: JavaScript, Forms and Ajax. Linux Journal (150):8.
HTML copy available through the ACM digital library. This particlar article isn't really about Ajax, but about JavaScript. The Ajax column was for the next month.
Yu D, Chandler A, Islam N, Serikov I. 2007. JavaScript instrumentation for browser security. Proceedings of the 34th Annual ACM SIGPLAN-SIGACT Symposium on Principles of Programming Languages :237-49.
Page 240 includes a section on usability and the main usability concern they have is with security pop-ups. Security pop-ups annoy most people and the non-techie usually doesn't bother to read and clicks on through (either that, or they're so paranoid they call the helpdesk).
Dreyfus P. 1998. The second wave: Netscape on usability in the services-based Internet. IEEE Internet Computing :36-40.
This short article, an IEEE "Industry Report," gives a great overview of how client-side technologies can interact with server-side technologies. It's a bit dated, but still sounds very modern. The article must have been very forward thinking for its time. Written by the Senior Manager of Technology Evangelism at Netscape Communications and Editor of View Source it is a biased source, but is still a good reference.
