What is Ajax web programming?

AJAX – (Asynchronous Javascript and XML ) is Javascript that sends XML to a web server which then sends back updates for specific sections of the web page, instead of the old way of updating the whole page. You can get more sophisticated applications this way. 
 Articles	 
 Wikipedia article on AJAX 		 Web Software Challenges Microsoft 		 Using Javaserver Faces Technology with AJAX 		 Ajax Debugging With Firebug – Dr. Dobb’s Journal 		 10 Things IT Needs to Know About Ajax 	 
 
 Apps and Examples	 
 
 http://numsum.com/ – sharable social spreadsheets 		 http://www.writely.com/ 		 Tools and Tutorials and articles about AJAX 		 
 http://pear.php.net/package/HTML_AJAX/ 			 60 More AJAX Tutorials 			 AJAX Desktop tutorial 		 
 		 Advanced RSS Ticket – DynamicDrive 		 Super AJAX Programming Seed 	 
 
 Frameworks	 
 Atlas AJAX Framework for ASP . NET 2.0 		 Adobe’s Spry AJAX Framework 		 Google’s AJAX Toolkit for Java