Sorry for long title but my concern is with constructing an ajax based application.
I have a version one of this application which does not require javascript to function, I want to migrate this to use ajax for various resources that come from a 3rd party soap web service.
How can I build an ajax application which when the browser does not have javascript or has it disabled will still function properly? (The server side code is tested and in production so I do have a solid foundation to fall back on just not sure how to do this in a graceful maner.)
I am familiar with all the tools (client and server side) and plan on using jquery framework but not sure about the part where javascript isn't running on the browser and how my application can still function.
JQuery is very good at supporting "graceful degredation" for web apps. You can apply the AJAX functionality to your non-javascript page by adding functionality after the page has loaded (through use of the $(document.ready() method). You'll need to catch the triggers on your page that would cause a page to reload ('click()', 'submit()', etc), stop the traditional browser event from firing ('preventDefault()'), and make calls to you AJAX functions. You may need to update and/or construct a few API wrappers or web service functions (depending on your environment) to generate responses that the AJAX functions can absorb and then render out to the browser.
This is a very common and well-practiced form of web app development. I suggest starting off with the jQuery documentation and if you run into issues, post specific questions (with code snippets) back here and I'm sure you'll get lots of answers and feedback. Good luck!