A computer system and method is disclosed that provides a single-page zero-footprint browser-based user interface with rich user interface features more commonly found in a traditional client-server application. The system and method includes one or more web servers, reporting servers, relational database servers, data warehouse servers, and client workstations for providing the browser-based application. A user requests that the browser-based application be retrieved from a server. A single page is received from the web server that contains code for a user interface for the application. The user interface with multiple content windows is displayed to a user. When at least one piece of data needs to be retrieved from a data source, an asynchronous request is sent to the server for the data from a hidden frame in the page. The data is received from the server and used in the application. Other requests for data are also made asynchronously.