Poll: Where do you assemble your on-the-fly HTML?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=127343

by edw519 • 18 years ago

6 10 18 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

GWT falls under your 2nd option, but avoids some of those CONS. It sends a small amount of javascript to bootstrap the process and determine what browser you are using. It then makes a round trip to obtain the rest of your code specific to the clients browser. This avoids sending unnecessary code for other browsers and cuts down on the need to preload a lot of javascript.

edw5192• 18 years ago

Interesting. Thanks for that feedback.

We may need a followup poll on frameworks.

I think I'm beginning to like this poll facility.

mechanical_fish2• 18 years ago

"It depends." Not a very useful answer, I know. :)

edw5192• 18 years ago

I infer that it means that you struggle with the same pros and cons I do. Right?

mechanical_fish2• 18 years ago

Bingo. I can't even say I lean in one direction or the other. It depends on the nature of the specific problem.

nostrademons• 18 years ago

Both. App is divided into components - the editor is one component, which is written as a JavaScript application that's kicked off with a single JS function call and handles all the HTML for itself, dynamically. The rest of the website is generated on the server and uses JS only for decoration.

I'd worry more about ease of programming than machine constraints. Webapps are rarely CPU-bound, so the overhead of template instantiation isn't likely to make much difference. You definitely want to keep related functionality together - in earlier drafts, I'd generated the HTML for the editor on the server and manipulated it with JQuery. This was a disaster - I could never remember whether functionality was in the HTML template or in the JavaScript, and I had to duplicate some logic in both places.

ratsbane• 18 years ago

I voted for both the first and second choices. The thing we're working on now is sort of a mixed approach. Everything is assembled first on server but then sections can be swapped out without reloading the whole page.

sovande• 18 years ago

On server, on client and from cache

michaelr• 18 years ago

Is it feasible for you to start on the server and wait until it presents a noticeable performance problem(if ever) before going client side? This would be my initial inclination.

wlievens• 18 years ago

You're missing the fact that you almost always do both.

Poll: Where do you assemble your on-the-fly HTML?

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