Chapter 15. User interaction

 

This chapter covers:

  • 15.1 The Model-View-Controller architecture 340
  • 15.2 The Web Command pattern 346
  • 15.3 Keeping the implementation simple 349
  • 15.4 Summary 355

One-way communication is entertaining at best, rude and authoritarian at worst. So far we’ve looked at presentation as if there were little or no opportunity for the user to talk back to the application. This is obviously not enough for most web applications.

In some applications, though, talking back may not be necessary. You might just want to get the latest stock quotes from a database and display them in a list. That’s relatively easy to do; eliminating interaction simplifies our job as programmers greatly.

When we do need interaction, there are challenges that are specific to creating that interaction, and it’s a different kind of challenge with web interfaces than with other kinds of user interfaces.

15.1. The Model-View-Controller architecture

15.2. The Web Command pattern

15.3. Keeping the implementation simple

15.4. Summary