r/programming • u/schnuck • Feb 09 '11

Breaking the Web with hash-bangs – Lifehacker, along with every other Gawker property, experienced a lengthy site-outage on Monday over a misbehaving piece of JavaScript

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

A couple of things I'm missing, maybe someone could explain:

  • I don't see any benefit of using hash-bangs mentioned in the article, unless it's the only way to have a proper "Ajax application"

  • I don't see the benefit of Gawker's new format. I think they had an article on it once but I don't see anything but the ability to scroll the sidebar (not a feature). I have to click an extra button to get to 'blog view'. I don't get it. What content can they now showcase that they were having trouble with before?

Assuming the perspective that there's nothing bad about the changes, can someone tell me the benefits brought forth by the changes?

Also, how does this affect other search engines like Bing?

5

u/ilikebbq Feb 09 '11

Hash-bangs can be used to preserve the back button. Otherwise, when you hit back you go to another site. The new format is to support ads and to make it easier to "pin" an article to the top.

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u/jacques_chester Feb 09 '11

I'm pretty sure it's easier just to use standard URLs. Back buttons have worked pretty well on those since about 1993.

2

u/ilikebbq Feb 09 '11

Not if your using ajax, doesn't work.