Technorati Turns 3, Redesigns Web Site with JavaScript Framework jQuery

JavaScriptSearch
Tuesday, July 25, 2006; 03:58 AM

On the third anniversary of blog syndication service Technorati, the team behind the project launched a redesigned version of their web site. There are significant changes both in layout and in functionality. The site sports improved web design and new features, powered by the jQuery JavaScript framework.

"After months of work and weeks of testing, we... released an updated version of technorati.com," said on his blog Technorati founder David Sifry . "Three years ago this month, Technorati was officially incorporated and became a 'real' company, moving out of the 'science project' phase of its life."

Some of the most important changes on the new web site are personalized pages, improved search speed and accuracy, Favorites and Popular categories, better tabs, tags and blog profiles. A well narrated webcast, introducing the myriad of new features, is available on the Technorati website.

The new Technorati uses jQuery as its primary JavaScript code base. jQuery is a very lightweight development framework (~10KB), and the benefits it offers in terms of bandwidth usage and loading speeds proved crucial in choosing it over other well-established JavaScript/AJAX libraries like Prototype and Scriptaculous.

The person who did Technorati's JavaScript coding was Ben Jenkins - a contract interface engineer for Technorati. Here are the reasons that made him go with jQuery: "jQuery is small (which is key), compatible, efficient, easy to use, and just plain kicks a**. We’ve actually been using it on Technorati for a few months now (since we launched our updated Favorites feature). With our new redesign out the door I’m looking forward to spending more time with jQuery and refactoring the rest of our code to take advantage of its features."

 Technorati.com: Before (L) and after.