Programming languages have become very important. To show the websites on your screen, there are some programming languages that you need. These programming languages can help to generate images and other information directly from the server to our screen.
AJAX and REST are two popular programming languages and tools to develop a website. To understand more about those 2 programming languages, here are the differences between AJAX and REST.
| AJAX | REST |
| Client-side | Server-side |
| Single request | Multiple request |
| Generate the data faster | Generate the data slower, but in the multiple requests at the same time |
What Is AJAX?
AJAX is a development tool that works on top of HTTP. It is used for making client-side web applications, which means it can only be used for web pages and not mobile websites, or other applications.
In addition, AJAX also is using HTML, CSS and JavaScript to load most of the data. This mechanism makes the data processing become faster. AJAX was first introduced as a way of improving website performance by allowing us to do some asynchronous tasks like requesting data from a server and displaying the results on our page immediately.
Somehow, AJAX is also used in so many websites to generate better and faster information for the clients. You can load data from the website faster. When you find a failure during the process, AJAX system can report it directly and resend the requests.
What Is REST?
REST is a web service design pattern that comes from the Web Services architecture model. It is a software design pattern that facilitates communication between two systems via the use of web services.
REST is server-side only, it can be used for building any kind of application on the server side, including mobile and web applications. REST also has a better level of security than AJAX because it has a better mechanism for checking if the request is valid or not.
For example, REST-based applications do not need to send data in an encrypted form to prevent an attacker from intercepting data or sending fake requests in order to get unauthorized access to data or users’ information.
How Are They Related?
Both AJAX and REST can process the request to the server, but they do it in a very different way. AJAX uses XMLHttpRequest to send data to the server, while REST uses the HTTP protocol.
There are many advantages of using REST over AJAX. REST can be used in different types of applications and devices, such as web browsers, desktop applications, mobile devices, and servers.
Ajax vs Rest
The first point about AJAX is client-side only. That means, it can be used for building mobile and web applications. This means, AJAX will process the request to the server in the clients’ screen. AJAX also uses HTTP to communicate with the server side
On the other hand, REST service can be used for building any kind of application on the server side, including mobile and web applications. So, REST is server-side only. Whereas, REST uses JSON as a data transfer format to communicate with the server side application.
Another major difference between AJAX and REST is that, AJAX sends all of its data in a single request whereas REST sends its data in multiple requests.
