Last night I read a paper by SPI Dynamics regarding security issues in AJAX.  The paper is worth the read and can be found here.  An important point that the paper makes regards how the lack of appropriate validation combines with more entry points into the backend of a web application because of AJAX and creates a greater security risk than ever before.

However, the above is not the point that stuck with me after reading the paper.  What remained in my mind was his last observation, that the Web 2 Ooooh culture has driven a lot of newcomers into the web development field and that these newcomers perform "cut and paste" web development.  Even more, these novice developers paste code without a "full understanding of the consequences."  As much as I dislike the idea that many web developers are pasting code without the full understanding of what they are doing, I must admit that there is truth to that statement.

Today, more than ever, developers are what I would call Google coding.  What I mean by this is that developers often do Google quick fixes to a problem they are encountering.  Often this is done in a way that avoids a full understanding of the problem that they are trying to resolve.  I know this is true because I have done it before, quickly googling for an immediate solution.  Usually, the symptoms of the problem are googled, which is evidenced in looking at almost every development forum.  Although, what I have learned and hopefully many others will as well, is that it is much faster to investigate the issue and pinpoint the exact root cause before opening up Google.  This will usually shed enough light as to how to fix the problem without having to do guess and check Google coding.  Even more, I believe that prematurely jumping into google coding sometimes ends up muddying the water and prolonging the time it takes to resolve the problem than if you had never launched google in the first place.

The question remains as to whether there are more novice programmers today than every before.  I believe that there are and I believe that this has the potential to be a good thing.  With so many new developers there is greater potential for some amazing creations.  Therefore, while the author of this article appears to be terrified by the new developers that have jumped on the web 2.0 train, I am excited to see the new sites that they create.  However, I must admit that I do strongly agree with the author in that these developers must start understanding the code that they are emitting.  If people google code and copy and paste faulty code then an entire web of sites has a greater possibility to be hijacked.  Unfortunately, the author is correct in his assertion that this is what has resulted from the current web 2.0 culture. 

I believe that one solution to the problem is for more people to contribute quality content into the public sphere and that there also be a move towards more advanced topics being examined in this content.  We are at a point now in the evolution of the web where stale content is glorified and mimicked.  Stale content is not only content that is old but is more importantly content that is narrow in its focus and range of expertise.  If more people were to create their own blog or to publish their thoughts in some fashion then this range would increase and a wider array of content would be able to be focused.  As a result there would be more of a push away from novice content that simply repeats what the other blogger is saying and a push towards more creative and advanced content.