In the recent web development world, there is one technology that's been on everyone's lips - AJAX. Everyone seems to be talking about how much it "could really change things" and how "it's the logical next step" for web applications, but there is at least one person that might just have you reconsidering - at least if you check out Marcus Baker's latest post over on his blog (lastcraft.com).

From Listen kids, AJAX is not cool: If you writing a user interface, make sure it responds in 1/10th of a second. That's a pretty simple rule, and if you break it, you will distract the user. This rule has pretty much become law, never mind lore. [...] You don't need stopwatches or video cameras to study users in this environment. Just five test subjects and perhaps the Apache logs. This is stuff anyone can do. Until now, the low level neurology has been left to the writers of web browsers. The two communities have been separated. Except now we have AJAX.

He goes on, talking more about the problems behind "low level user interfaces with requests over the internet" such as what AJAX performs. His example (a customer info form) brings to light one of the issues that some developers don't think about - what happens if the remote server is slow? Does that annoy the user? Enough to make them balk a bit at finishing the form?

He agrees that AJAX has its uses, but they are not as a part of anything that the user directly touches. Regrabbing a recordset is one example he gives.

How are you using this "hot technology" in your projects? Will the user see issues if something happens to your remote server (slowness or downtime)? All things to consider...