Ajax PHP or Javascript

codeSpinner

Hi, I'm building a web application that's using Ajax for certain actions. Based on some of these actions areas of the HTML page will be updated.

Would you suggest (a) generating the HTML for these areas on the server side and send it back in the Ajax response? Or (b) only send the required data in the Ajax response and build the HTML via Javascript (in the client's browser so to speak)?

dalecosp

Probably the latter, but it would depend a bit on your JS abilities. One point in favor would be the size of the ResponseText sent by the Ajax server script. If it gets busy you'll be better off, performance-wise, (network in particular) to hand all that stuff to the client.

My $.02,

sneakyimp

Another advantage of just sending the required data is that you might be able to server other types of clients (e.g., an iPhone app or other non-html client) from your server. I like JSON (see [man]json_encode[/man]) myself but some folks prefer XML.

This also relates to your templating strategy. It's been my experience that keeping your design/layout/presentation separate from your application's logic is a good idea. Beyond knowing that in a vague sort of way, I don't really have any good ideas about how to organize one's templates that might include javascript in addition to HTML.

EDIT: If you do end up using Javascript to generate HTML elements in your page, I would strongly recommend the use of jQuery or some other layer between your javascript and the browser. Browsers have a lot of tiny differences that can cause your code to work on browser but not another. It can drive you totally insane.

codeSpinner

Thanx for the replies. I will send some JSON data then an build the HTML via JS. This also "feels" a bit cleaner as you said in terms of keeping certain things separated.