Tracking Ajax Applications

Having been a student of the technologies that had wonder-twin activated into what the collective "we" now know as Ajax, I am curious for some of the more sticky answers to topics few seem to ask about.

I'll leave browser caching issues, erratic server response, and all that jazz hiding under the rug on this go, but the one that I'm curious about is tracking.

I love hearing interviewees get excited about which Ajax framework they love best (kinda reminds me of the browser wars days... damn we're a conflict seeking species aren't we). Having come from the "client-side application programming" world, I particularly love to hear web programmers (curiously, a specific breed of web programmer that is closer to UI than the typical server side CGI programmers I work with most consistently, and perhaps therein lies part of my problem, but I digress). I love to hear that Ajax is working to bridge the gap between traditional web programming and client-side programming worlds. (Never mind all the nasty security rules and OS interfaces that aren't even on the table yet, except in proprietary subsets of "JScript", Flash, and various other conspiracies to "own" the Web via it's defacto standards landscape... er, stay on target.) I applaud the ideal expressed, but I'm concerned the "car" is being driven by folks that don't see enough of the end game to accommodate a functional business model's emergence... not for the big guys from corporate subsidy land (uh, last I heard Google doesn't make it's money from its awesome search suggest feature, or even it's online spreadsheet capability)... I mean the ma & paps on the web, the small and giant alike that want the coolism of Ajax, but that can't connect the dots between coolism and cold hard cash.

Welp, having played in this space for years now, (along with many others of like mind though perhaps currently un-united) I think there is one key piece of technology that needs to be factored in, in order to provide that critical element... the connection of the dots between technology and revenue. Yip, many folks have heard of it, in myth and legend, it's called tracking.

The challenge then is one of suggestions for how tracking can be implemented in an Ajax application that does most or all of its data shuttling behind the scenes, replacing the traditional step based models with a glorious charcoal smudge where ambiguity replaces distinction in all but the sweet-ass looking UI.

I open the floor... anybody out there?

I for one was grateful to Jerry Lewis for his recent apology to GLAAD for providing them with some much desired air time. It's a tribute to a man who does so much to help those with such a debilitating condition, as Muscular Dystrophy. Thank you Jerry, hero of mankind, nice man, ...nice science man. You are a gem, a humorous, hard gem.

However, I was immediately offended at the inflammatory remarks leveled against the much beloved Slurpee. Deriding that great hot-day-mitigation device with the insulting vernacular, "slur". "It was entirely uncalled for," said someone who believed in something. "I demand an apology from GLAAD for this affront to that great American institution" she went on to say.