Microsoft ASP.NET and AJAX: Architecting Web Applications

This book is the Web counterpart to another recently released book I co-authored with Andrea Saltarello: Microsoft .NET: Architecting Applications for the Enterprise (Microsoft Press, 2008). I wrote it, in part, in response to the many architectural questions—both small questions and big ones—that I was asked repeatedly while teaching ASP.NET, AJAX, and Silverlight classes. Everybody in the industry is committed to AJAX. Everybody understands the impact of it. Everybody recognizes the enormous power that can be derived from its employment in real-world solutions. Very few, though, know exactly how to make it happen. There are so many variations to AJAX and so many implementations that even after you have found one that suits your needs, you are left wondering whether that is the best possible option. The fact is that AJAX triggered a chain reaction in the world of the Web. AJAX represents a change of paradigm for Web applications. And, as the history of science proves, a paradigm shift has always had a deep impact, especially in scenarios that were previously stable and consolidated.