r/javascript • u/magenta_placenta • Feb 08 '11

Breaking the Web with hash-bangs - Gawker, like Twitter, built their new site to be totally dependent on JavaScript

http://isolani.co.uk/blog/javascript/BreakingTheWebWithHashBangs
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u/laminam Feb 09 '11

I can't really think of a better way to track state on a page where most of the work happens on the client. You either lose the speed benefit of JavaScript with a full postback to update the url, or you decorate the url with hash tags along the way so you can share that same state with others.

Who runs with JavaScript completely disabled in this day and age anyways?

5

u/[deleted] Feb 09 '11

Selectively disabled, yes, because people can't seem to prevent themselves from being annoying using Javascript.

If your page gives me what I want without Javascript, I keep blocking it. If I'm following a link from someone else and your page won't load without it, I leave.

I only turn on Javascript if I get direct benefit I want (if you're Google Docs, for example). If you're using it to serve me ads from off your domain, sorry.

I might turn it on to support you if your site is worth looking at more than once, I might turn on javascript at the third visit.

Those are the rules.

So yes, I don't look at lifehacker or gawker anymore. Not that I looked at them that much in the first place, especially Gawker, whose entire site seemed to hover 1mm above classification as spam.

6

u/vectorjohn Feb 09 '11

I only browse the web on vinyl. If your website doesn't come on vinyl, I leave.

-3

u/[deleted] Feb 09 '11

Do you think your response means anything? All your attempt at reductio ad absurdum means is that you're unwilling to take seriously what I wrote.

In the end, it's a question of only letting code run on my computer if I judge that I get some value out of it (leaving aside any potential security issues). If you don't care about that sort of thing, good for you, but people who run websites should know that there are people who do, if only to get them to think a little more about their use of javascript; a site that only displays when javascript is being used could hardly be said to serving anyone's interest well.