System and method for providing a browser-based user interface

A method comprising:

• receiving a request from a user to access a browser-based application, said browser-based application requiring no web components to be installed before using the application other than a web browser;
• determining that at least one piece of data needs to be displayed in the application;
• retrieving the at least one piece of data from at least one data source to include in the application;
• generating a single web page that contains code for a user interface of the application, wherein the user interface remains on a single page and does not change pages as the user interacts with the application;
• returning the single page to the browser so the user interface can be displayed to the user;
• receiving an asynchronous request for additional data from the single page;
• retrieving the additional data from a data source asynchronously so the user can continue interacting with the user interface while the additional data is being retrieved;
• and
• returning the additional data to the single page for use in the application.

A system comprising:

• a server computer;
• a client computer coupled to the server computer over a network;
• wherein the client computer has a browser-based user interface requiring no web components to be installed before using the user interface other than a web browser;
• wherein the client computer is operable to send an initial request to the server for the browser-based user interface having multiple content windows, to allow the user to interact with the user interface on a single page and without changing to a different page, and to send to the server asynchronous requests for data as a user interacts with the user interface;
• and
• wherein the server computer is operable to receive the initial request from the client computer for the browser-based user interface, to generate the user interface into a single page, to send the single page user interface to the client computer, to receive the asynchronous requests for data, to use an application business logic to retrieve the asynchronously requested data from at least one data source, and to return the asynchronously requested data to the client computer.