Kevin Joseph writes:

>How to handle
>popup pick/selection lists.  Do you send a list of a 100/1000/? valid
>values in a dropdown or use a separate window and javascript to have the
>user select a value, maybe with the ability to filter the list?  Would
>your users accept a perceived loss of functionality moving from windows
>(or any stateful gui) to the web?  A whole new world.

A middle ground here that addresses both of these issues is Macromedia's
Flash. It allows much better interactivity than straight HTML because UI
elements can be updated without having to rewrite the whole page. Flash
can communicate with the serer on a keystroke-by-keystroke level if
necessary, making it possible to handle things like very large picklists
by using incremental selection. (The Flash "movie" [it's called a movie
even though it's not being used for animation] can send and receive
packets of XML while the user is typing, for example.)

Flash is often better than Java for these pure-UI applications for
several reasons:

  - It's simpler; all of Flash is geared to UI.

  - It means that your UI can be handled by your graphic
    and HI designers rather than your programmers.

  - Users often disable Java or their companies prohibit
   Java because of perceived security concerns.

  - The number of platform-specific gotchas is much reduced.

  - Microsoft and Macromedia aren't at war, so Microsoft
    won't be putting in "bugs" that "unintentionally"
    disable Flash. Not yet, anyway.

The downside, of course, is that most people aren't familiar with Flash
outside the graphic arts world, so there's a learning curve.

-- Bruce



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