Improvised Web Delights

• Simpler interface.
• I'm more familiar with the templating framework.
• I love the follow system. Many of the blogs I actually follow are already there.
• It just feels more "fun."
• Argyle & Gingham lives there.

Let's make this quick. 

Proposed UI: List of articles on the left side, content area on the right.

Desired behavior: Click an article in the list, load the content on the right.

Bonus: Append a hash tag to the URL for bookmarking. When a user hits a hashed URL, load the node in the content area.

Step 1

Build a View to spit out your articles. We'll need the node ID to retrieve our content, but maybe we'll be using pretty urls with the ID nowhere to be found, so let's use the data-* attribute of HTML5 to store the node ID. Here's a link to the field I created because posterous really doesn't like dealing with code: http://grab.by/3oAi

Step 2

Build your module:

 


<?php


// $Id$


 


/**


* Implementation of hook_init().


*/


function mymodule_ajax_init() {


drupal_add_js(drupal_get_path('module', 'mymodule_ajax') . '/js/mymodule_ajax.js');


}


 


/**


* Implementation of hook_menu().


*/


function mymodule_ajax_menu() {


// create query path


  $items['ajax/get/node'] = array(


    'page callback' => 'mymodule_ajax_get_node',


    'type' => MENU_CALLBACK,


    'access arguments' => array('access content'),


  );


  return $items;


}


 


function mymodule_ajax_get_node($nid) {


// get the node object


  $node = node_load($nid);


// render the node


  $view = node_view($node);


// return the rendered node as json


  drupal_json(array('status' => 0, 'data' => $view));


}


 

Step 3

Build out mymodule_ajax.js

 


Drupal.behaviors.thirtyeight_ajax_get_node = function() {


// so whenever there's data-nid on a node…


  $('a[data-nid]').bind('click', function(){


var nid = $(this).attr('data-nid');


parseUrl(nid);


    return false;


  });


 


var parseUrl = function(nid) {


// …do an ajax get…


$.get('ajax/get/node/'+ parseInt(nid, 10), null, function(data){


var result = Drupal.parseJson(data);


// … plop the resulting html somewhere (should be parameterized)


 $('#sidebar-left').html(result.data);


// … and update the location bar


location.hash = '#' + nid;


});


}


 


// check for # in the URL on load and grab and show the respective node


var match = /#(.*)/;


if (match.exec(window.location.href)) {


parseUrl(match.exec(window.location.href)[1]);


}


}


 

That's really the gist of it.

Consider this a framework. It will need to be customized to suit your needs. For one, you probably want to parameterize the eventual location of the returned node — I'm just loading it into #sidebar-left for testing. If you're going to use this on multiple sections of your site in multiple views, maybe set #sidebar-left to a variable that you define on the view itself. 

I'd like to make the back button work. jQuery History seems to have solved this problem using an invisible iframe, but its a bit out of scope for now.

Can you think of any way to make this even better?

A self.reddit asking "Americans: is it really that bad?":

I have to admit that the image I have of the US has become even far worse after I started to frequent reddit than it was before (which wasn't all that great either).

It seems you have a ridiculous laws (teens going to prison for consensual sex, weed-possesion can land you in jail); corrupt and violent cops; state-lawyers and judges who will protect said cops. It's basically a settled in, tax-funded mafia. It can protect you at times, but the risk to get fucked over is actually your main concern.

If you do get fucked over (or actually made a mistake.. like doing drugs) and end up in prison, it's a coinflip whether your life will be permanently destroyed there through violence, rape or other forms of abuse while guards and officials laugh at you.

Your two parties seem to be different sides of the same rotten coin while lobbyism is the main force behind politics. The first black president wins with health-care reform as his major inner-political topic and the lobbyists still manage to break the reform. You will probably still have to deal with a health-care system that can force you into bankruptcy (or death) more or less out of the blue.

Part of the reason for that is that one of the most popular TV-stations broadcasts propaganda that would make even Goebbels proud.

A president or minister doesn't have to fear to be prosecuted even if it's more than just likely that something was fishy during his term(s).

In school you might actually be thought creationism and you will probably be way behind most countries in quality.

Many of your cities are unsafe to the point that an American woman who visited my hometown of Berlin (which is one of the most dangerous cities in Germany) stated that she feels so much safer here.

What do you get in return for that? Maybe 1 or 2 cars more on average during your lifetime and more inches on your monitor.

Yeah I know, news tend to be bad, but it's just that the scandals are so frequent and have such a scale that I started to wonder if it is really that bad.

So, how bad is the situation really in the US?

-- eric