alternative to cross-domain javascripting?

Question

currently i am relying on a proxy script to handle this problem of Single Origin Policy. it is slow, and creates overhead. Not to mention, javascript is not rendered.

is there a working alternative out there?

Answer 1

Oh dear, I think the solution you're looking for is with IFRAMEs. However the iframe approach is both a mental and technical undertaking. I suggest you start with this guide:

Cross-Domain Communication with IFrames

The alternative approach is getting data from another server asynchronously using script tags and json:

<script src="http://remotesite.com/path/to/script/blah.js"></script>

You can create a new SCRIPT tag element to pass and load data and append to DOM or insert the markup into an elements innerHTML.

I'm sure you can find some detailed examples and ways to implement but one thing you should keep a track of with the new SCRIPT method is adding so many tot he DOM. This might help and provide a starting point for you:

function require (url, callback) {
    if (!isScriptLoaded(url)) { 
        document.write('<script src="' + url + '" type="text/javascript" charset="utf-8"><\/script>');

        if (callback) {
            callback();
        }
    }
}

function isScriptLoaded(src) {
    var scriptsLoaded =  {};
    var scriptTags    = document.getElementsByTagName("script");

    for (var i = 0, script; script = scriptTags[i]; i++) {
        if (script.src) { 
            scriptsLoaded[script.src] = 1;
        }
    };

    if (scriptsLoaded[src]) {
        return true; 
    }

    return false;
}

(untested, but should work!)

Either way - best of luck.

Answer 2

If you can provide a callback name as a parameter to the service providing the JavaScript code in question, then you can append a script tag to your document, with a src attribute pointing to the service call. Otherwise, you're out of luck.

Answer 3

Use an iframe and try window.postMessage(message, origin) (it would be parent.postMessage from the iframe and iframeElement.contentWindow.postMessage from the top page) for all of the latest major browsers (Firefox, IE, Safari, Chrome, etc.) and changing/polling window.name for old browsers.

Answer 4

JSON-P is pretty much ideal for this kind of thing. If you're using jQuery, or similar JavaScript libraries, your job is made even easier:

http://docs.jquery.com/Ajax/jQuery.getJSON#urldatacallback

Of course, it will depend on exactly what you are trying to do that will determine whether to use JSON-P, hidden iframes, postMessage, Flash proxies, or any other exotic solution.

Answer 5

If you control both domains and only care about Firefox 3.5+, you can use the XMLHttpRequest Object and set up permissions with Access Control.