Comments on: Changing the DOM

By: Thomas W

Thomas W — Thu, 03 May 2007 19:53:41 +0000

DomAxh (http://domaxh.sourceforge.net) converts XMLHTTPResponse objects into (X)HTML DOM, reducing the need for innerHTML (of course, it’s not as fast as innerHTML) when working with AJAX (AHAH or whatever)

By: chochis

chochis — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 11:57:07 +0000

I know why! appendChild does a request to check if the document is still correct, and more! In IE does every time, in FF just once!

By: staima

staima — Fri, 07 Jul 2006 18:45:53 +0000

Jeremy Keith said: innerHTML is faster, but “heavy-handed” and “sledgehammer”, that doesn’t mean it’s bad! that might sound negative but what I’m striving for is accuracy… innerHTML is fast, easy, proprietary and heavy-handed… DOM methods are slower, long-winded, standardized and precise… Now, which technology have I described with a negative spin? The answer to that question is entirely subjective and depends on where your particular priorities lie!? Please read what I wrote and stop misrepresenting my position on this… because I haven’t got one!

Yeah, right!

Everyone needs a hug.

By: Ã§iÃ§ek gÃ¶nder

Ã§iÃ§ek gÃ¶nder — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 10:06:22 +0000

Ã§iÃ§ek gÃ¶nderirken cicekclub a reklam verirken e-reklamix e gidin

By: Dan Webb

Dan Webb — Fri, 28 Apr 2006 01:36:16 +0000

Blaise: I didn’t say that Base.js is better at manipulating the DOM that DOMBuilder, I said it was better than the OO solution I have. Base.js an OO wrapper - its got nothing to do with the DOM. It’s great at what it does do.

innerHTML is much faster but the big difference is only really on IE. It does have large disadvantages though and is obviously not the most elegant way of implementing DOM manipulation as an API. Shoving strings around just seems wrong to me. Thing is though is that IE happens to be faster with innerHTML and until that’s not the case we are stuck with it. I don’t think its the best way - it’s just the way that works best at the moment.

By: Chris Iufer

Chris Iufer — Fri, 21 Apr 2006 22:09:09 +0000

I cant really speak to the argument that innerHTML is faster, but I can argue for the use of document.createElement. In my experience with relay.statsinsight.com, it really came down to using createElement exclusively because of my heavy use of Objects. For example, I made a class for a Directory and inside it, created a method to generate a visual element. If you use innerHTML in this case, the element has no logical connection to the object, but when you use createElement you automatically get a direct link to the element as an object. This saves you having to give each element an ID then using getElementById to use it. I could simply do a line of code in the class like this.icon = document.createElement('img'); and from then on i could access that icon by directory.icon... simple and effective when you start getting complicated in your app design.

By: Jan BraÅ¡na

Jan BraÅ¡na — Mon, 17 Apr 2006 21:01:07 +0000

Maybe somthing like AHAH (http://microformats.org/wiki/rest/ahah) would work better here?

By: Tyler McMullen

Tyler McMullen — Mon, 17 Apr 2006 16:36:54 +0000

Hah. I never realized that innerHTML was that much faster. That makes me feel good for using it, when in the past I had just considered a lazy habit.

But yeah, really consider XSLT next time. It makes the code so much easier to work with and it is incredibly fast with large XML documents.

The project that I'm working on right now is relatively large. Its a survey system to be used within a rather large international company to survey their plants and offices around the world, regarding productivity and efficiency. I have dozens of XSL files for this... some with just a few lines in them. But it makes the JS so much easier to read... and much smaller. I did the first version without XSLT and ended up with 1000 line+ JS files. The latest version however has JS files with no more than 350 lines each in them.

Very nice. :)

By: Jeremy Keith

Jeremy Keith — Sun, 16 Apr 2006 02:45:53 +0000

Dustin wrote: “As for Jeremy Keith, I’m done giving him crap on the matter, and I don’t want to lose a good friend over some stupid debate”

Dustin, you gave me crap because you (incorrectly) thought that I was favouring DOM methods over innerHTML. In fact, all I did was compare the pros and cons of both without declaring either to be superior or inferior.

Please read what I wrote and stop misrepresenting my position on this… because I haven’t got one; I’m quite happy sitting on the fence.

By: Jonathan Snook

Jonathan Snook — Sat, 15 Apr 2006 02:58:28 +0000

Anup: one thing I’ve been doing is creating HTML shells on the page that have no content (therefore, screenreaders wouldn’t hear or have any issues) and simply populating them via JavaScript/AJAX as need be.