"Though it's been around for a while, AJAX is now a hot topic in the application developer community because it brings cross-platform rich user interfaces to web applications without having to use products like Microsoft .NET or Macromedia," said Steve Benfield (pictured), VP of strategy & technology evangelism, ClearNova, as he announced his upcoming session at the Atlanta Java Users Group next week.

Benfield is due to give the session, provocatively titled "Injecting Life into Boring Web Applications with AJAX," on Tuesday, June 21 from 6:30 to 9:30 PM at the Holiday Inn Select Atlanta Perimeter Dunwoody.

His co-presenter will be ClearNova's CTO, Sriram (Ram) Venkataraman. "We plan to explain what all the fuss is about, dispel some myths and advise how best to take advantage of the trend," Benfield explained.

The discussion will include:

• How AJAX works
• Uses and considerations for building AJAX-enabled applications
• Pitfalls to implementing an AJAX framework
• Comparison of an application made using HTML with one made with AJAX
• A live demonstration and Q&A.

ClearNova, based in Alpharetta, part of Georgia's growing technology corridor, provides rapid application development software and expertise to power and deliver today's complex Web-based business applications. Its flagship product, ThinkCAP, was originally released in 2001.