aking requests to third-party web services from an
AJAX application is
a pain, but new web services that offer the option of returning
JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) instead of XML can provide significant relief. In fact, if you make web services requests using the dynamic
script tag approach -- and the web service lets you specify a JavaScript callback function -- you can have unfettered access to the web service in a seamless, cross-domain, cross-browser fashion.
Here's what you need to try out this dynamic script tag request:
- My
JSONscriptRequest class
- Access to a web service that returns JSON and lets you specify a callback function
To create my class, I distilled a lot of existing information, and then adapted it to fit no. 2 above. Until recently, finding a web service that returns JSON and lets you specify a callback function was, well, darn near impossible unless you wrote one yourself. Fortunately, Yahoo recently has offered the option on many of their REST-ish web services. Notably, their many search web services, and their geocoding, map image, and traffic web services, now can return JSON wrapped in a callback function.
