Introduction to Anthem.NET
By Howard Richards
How to do AJAX without writing any JavaScript.
Introduction
AJAX is something lots of ASP.NET developers are interested in, but there are a number of AJAX libraries and solutions out there - so which one do you go for?
When looking myself, the criteria I used were:
•support ASP.NET 2.0 as that's what I'm using,
•soak as seamlessly as possible with VS2005, ideally without having to hand-code client-side JavaScript, and
•support ASP.NET functionality as closely as possible.
Having looked at the various AJAX libraries out there (including Atlas), I noticed that the ASP.NET forums were using a library I hadn't seen before (and it's not Atlas!). Web searches led me to Jason Diamond's MyAjax.net which has recently been redesigned and launched on SourceForge.Net as Anthem.NET, so it's now an official OpenSource project. There are also some discussion forums.
Note: It was pointed out in the comments that I had not addressed the issue of cross-browser compatibility, which is obviously quite important! I'm glad to report that Anthem.NET works on IE, FireFox, and Safari (reportedly much better than Atlas, as I write). The developer has even put work into making sure it runs under Mono as well.
Just Another AJAX Library?
So, is Anthem just another AJAX library? No, and I'd even venture [tin helmet on] it's the best one I've seen for ASP.NET. Anthem is so easy to use, it's almost a crime. It ticked all my criteria (it supports both .NET 1.1 and .NET 2.0), and has a number of built-in AJAX-enabled controls. It supports viewstate, so you can get control states and page info back in callbacks. It works seamlessly with web usercontrols, and master pages; and having used it on a live application, I can say it's reasonably stable. Best of all, you won't need to write any JavaScript (or XMLscript).
