We have Tabs-Menu controls which rely on jQuery library and the dev-manager insist that i should get the functions that controls are using into a separate java-script file so we don't have to reference/rely on the whole jQuery, so it made me wonder.. is it a bad idea to edit the jQuery files ?
Yes it is a very bad idea. It would be a nightmare to maintain with all the bug fixes and feature changes the jQuery team would make.
You should write plugins to modify the behavior as you want.
The gzipped production version of jQuery is 31K. Not only is this an unmaintainable idea, but this is a pre-optimization. Any images beyond tiny PNGs or GIFs will likely be as large or larger than the entire jQuery library.
Additionally, this is time that could be spent addressing actual problems. I don't know what sort of userbase you're targeting, but unless every one of your users is on dialup, 31K will take no time at all to download.
is it a bad idea to edit the jQuery files ?
Yes. If you edit the core jQuery library, you make it much more difficult to use future versions of jQuery, which may include important new features, bug fixes, etc. If you make your changes in plugins, as you should, you can just drop in the new versions of jQuery when they're released.
Well I'd say it's a pretty bad idea. You really want the responsibility of maintaining the mess you have left after chopping it out? Are you an expert on the jQuery library? Do you understand all of the side effects? You would be better off rewriting portions of your Tabs-Menu controls without jQuery than trying to chop out bits of jQuery. I presume that the issue is that you don't want the "overhead" of including a relatively large script for a small set of features. This is unfortunately the way of jQuery. Either
Accept that you have to use jQuery, and make the most of having it referenced
Rewrite your Tabs-Menu controls without jQuery
any other option is going to be painful. Insist that your dev-manager reads the answers to the question.
There are so many lightboxes to choose from, I'm looking for a very lightweight one to use in an embedded javascript widget that would be a single domain name. I saw the perfect one on chainreactioncycles.com, it popped up out of nowhere so I took a screenshot:
I tried looking for info on it on the page source, but couldn't find anything that would let me trace where it came from... Would anybody know of one like this? Or exactly that one?
If not exactly like above, anything similar would be great too, keeping the following in mind:
Very small javascript download (animation not needed)
Self contained, not dependent on any libraries other than jquery (since I'm already using that anyway).
Works in major browsers
Close button (like GetSatisfaction or UserVoice)
Dims background
Avoids javascript namespace conflicts (or can easily be made to avoid them)
CSS styling of lightbox does not interfere with site styling
Have you used an existing lightbox scripts for this same purpose with similar requirements? Did you roll your own? Insights welcome!
What you are looking for is called a modal box.
Here is a list of them
... and here is a striking replica of what you are looking for
Check out Zoombox.. It sounds like what you're looking for... Simple to use... Allows custom content.. jQuery Module... From past experience it covers what you have outlined as requirements etc
http://www.grafikart.fr/zoombox will tell you all you need to know.
I'm looking for a plug-in to present a table of data in a HTML page. Data is coming from Ajax as XML or JSON. Requirements are fairly standard:
Plug is supported, with a live community
Table binds to data, or a mechanism to fill table with data.
Columns are sortable with the standard UI
Support for filters
Support for search (assisted search)
Preferably, table looks good by default without any change. Able to customize
every aspect of the table
Support interaction. e.g. Mouse Hover or Click
Customizable.
Paging
Scroll bars
Overall I think these are very basic requirements. This question also fold another question: how do you choose a plug-in? Looking at the jQuery plugin page, shows there are 19 pages of plugins, with names such as "Yet another table plug-in".
I don't a "Yet Another ...". I'm looking for the canonical plug-in. The one that "everyone is using", which has live community, people to consult with, reasonable documentation (mainly examples), and bug fixes.
Googl'ing for 'jquery table plug-in' yields 70,000 articles, but I cannot identify any plug-in has multiple references.
Please also advise about a general strategy how do you pick a plug-in. Which web site to you go? Which blogs do you follow? etc. Down the road I'll have to choose a charting plugin (although there, there seems to be two main plug-ins that stands up: Flot and jQuery Google chart).
I don't believe that there is an ultimate strategy to find exactly the plugin you need.
At least not without trying different options. Usually i limit the selection by what a see and read about a plugin (looking at exactly the things you mention: is there a good documentation? are there demos? is it still supported?), but in the end there's no way around trying out.
That said there are two plugins i used, which both do a very decent job, though i never used them for processing json-responses, only for making existing tables more dynamic and user-friendly. But both should do what you want.
http://www.datatables.net/usage/server-side
http://tablesorter.com/docs/example-ajax.html
Lately i prefer datatables as i find the plugin easier to configure and better looking by default. (And as i use jquery-ui already i really appreciate the support for themeroller).
But i guess in the end the choice is pretty subjective.
I would recommend you jqGrid. It meets all of your requirements.
I am intrigued by IxEdit and its full-javascript approach that should allow to build nice web pages powered by JQuery effects.
I like also the opportunity to use it on many platforms.
But, is it worth a try ?
Is it complete ? Has it compatibility issues ? Are there better alternative tools ?
Don't rely on WYSIWYG editors--My guess is that this editor screws up performance like Frontpage, Dreamweaver -and the likes screws up HTML.
jQuery is pretty simple to understand, once you get hold of the concept of anonymous functions.. And with Stack Overflow at hand, you should be able to get where you want to go in no time.
Also: jQuery is the framework with the largest community and the framework with the largest plugin repository--need a gallery-thingie? No biggie, just browse the tons of plugins and find one that fits your needs.
Well, as JQuery isn't THAT complicated, I wouldn't pay for tools like that.
They also don't support any plugins I guess.
But it's free, so just try it...
I've just d/l IxEdit and am actually kind of excited about it.
It seems you do have to be careful about starting with a blank slate: I tried applying it to an existing page with a few jQ plugins and and it broke.
As for the WYSIWYG aspect of it, I think it would be great for beginners, as it generates the code on the fly, and you have to copy and paste the code into the page. This can give a noob the opportunity to see the code that's made and make sense of how it works.
My two cents.
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I've had a lot of good experiences learning about web development on w3schools.com. It's hit or miss, I know, but the PHP and CSS sections specifically have proven very useful for reference.
Anyway, I was wondering if there was a similar site for jQuery. I'm interested in learning, but I need it to be online/searchable, so I can refer back to it easily when I need the information in the future.
Also, as a brief aside, is jQuery worth learning? Or should I look at different JavaScript libraries? I know Jeff uses jQuery on Stack Overflow and it seems to be working well.
Thanks!
Edit: jQuery's website has a pretty big list of tutorials, and a seemingly comprehensive documentation page. I haven't had time to go through it all yet, has anyone else had experience with it?
Edit 2: It seems Google is now hosting the jQuery libraries. That should give jQuery a pretty big advantage in terms of publicity.
Also, if everyone uses a single unified aQuery library hosted at the same place, it should get cached for most Internet users early on and therefore not impact the download footprint of your site should you decide to use it.
2 Months Later...
Edit 3: I started using jQuery on a project at work recently and it is great to work with! Just wanted to let everyone know that I have concluded it is ABSOLUTELY worth it to learn and use jQuery.
Also, I learned almost entirely from the Official jQuery documentation and tutorials. It's very straightforward.
10 Months Later...
jQuery is a part of just about every web app I've made since I initially wrote this post. It makes progressive enhancement a breeze, and helps make the code maintainable.
Also, all the jQuery plug-ins are an invaluable resource!
3 Years Later...
Still using jQuery just about every day. I now author jQuery plug-ins and consult full time. I'm primarily a Djangonaut but I've done several javascript only contracts with jQuery. It's a life saver.
From one jQuery user to another... You should look at templating with jQuery (or underscore -- see below).
Other things I've found valuable in addition to jQuery (with estimated portion of projects I use it on):
jQuery Form Plugin (95%)
jQuery Form Example Plugin (75%)
jQuery UI (70%)
Underscore.js (80%)
CoffeeScript (30%)
Backbone.js (10%)
Rick Strahl and Matt Berseth's blogs both tipped me into jQuery and man am I glad they did. jQuery completely changes a) your client programming perspective, b) the grief it causes it you, and c) how much fun it can be!
http://www.west-wind.com/weblog/
http://mattberseth.com/
I used the book jQuery in Action
http://www.amazon.com/jQuery-Action-Bear-Bibeault/dp/1933988355/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1219716122&sr=1-1 (I bought it used at Amazon for about $22). It has been a big help into bootstrapping me into jQuery. The documentation at jquery.com are also very helpful.
A place where jQuery falls a little flat is with its UI components. Those don't seem to be quite ready for primetime just yet.
It could be that Prototype or MooTools or ExtJS are as good as jQuery. But for me, jQuery seems to have a little more momentum behind it right now and that counts for something for me.
Check jQuery out. It is very cool!
A great resource for learning jQuery is: Learning jQuery. The author, Karl Swedberg, also co-wrote the book titled... ready? Yup, Learning jQuery. Remy Sharp also has great info geared towards the visual aspects of jQuery on his blog.
--SEAN O
I used Prototype for about six months before I decided to learn jQuery. To me, it was like a night and day difference. For example, in Prototype you will loop over a set of elements checking if one exists and then setting something in it, in jQuery you just say $('div.class').find('[name=thing]') or whatever and set it.
It's so much easier to use and feels a lot more powerful. The plugin support is also great. For almost any common js pattern, there's a plugin that does what you want. With prototype, you'll be googling for blogs that have the snippet of code you need.
It is very much worth it. jQuery really makes JavaScript fun again. It's as if all of JavaScript best practices were wrapped up into a single library.
I learned it through jQuery in Action (Manning), which I whipped through over a weekend. It's a little bit behind the current state of affairs, especially in regard to plug-ins, but it's a great introduction.
There are numerous JavaScript libraries that are worth at least a cursory review to see if they suit your particular need. First, come up with a short list of criteria to guide your selection and evaluation process.
Then, check out a high level framework comparison/reviews somewhere like Wikipedia, select a few that fit your criteria and interest you. Test them out to see how they work for you. Most, if not all, of these libraries have websites w/ reference documentation and user group type support.
To put some names out there, Prototype, script.aculo.us, Jquery, Dojo, YUI...those all seem to have active users and contributers, so they are probably worth reading up on to see if they meet your needs.
Jquery is good, but with a little extra effort, maybe you'll find that something else works better for you.
Good luck.
I found that these series of tutorials (“jQuery for Absolute Beginners” Video Series) by Jeffery Way are VERY HELPFUL.
It targets those developers who are new to jQuery. He shows how to create many cool stuff with jQuery, like animation, Creating and Removing Elements and more.
I learned a lot from it. He shows how it's easy to use jQuery.
Now I love it and I can read and understand any jQuery script even if it's complex.
Here is one example I like "Resizing Text"
1- jQuery:
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">
$(function() {
$('a').click(function() {
var originalSize = $('p').css('font-size'); // Get the font size.
var number = parseFloat(originalSize, 10); // That method will chop off any integer
// from the specifid varibale "originalSize".
var unitOfMassure = originalSize.slice(-2); // Store the unit of massure, Pixle or Inch.
$('p').css('font-size', number / 1.2 + unitOfMassure);
if (this.id == 'larger') {
$('p').css('font-size', number * 1.2 + unitOfMassure);
} // Figure out which element is triggered.
});
});
</script>
2- CSS Styling:
<style type="text/css" >
body{
margin-left:300px;text-align:center;
width:700px;
background-color:#666666;}
.box {
width:500px;
text-align:justify;
padding:5px;
font-family:verdana;
font-size:11px;
color:#0033FF;
background-color:#FFFFCC;}
</style>
2- HTML:
<div class="box">
Larger |
Smaller
<p>
In today’s video tutorial, I’ll show you how to resize text every
time an associated anchor tag is clicked. We’ll be examining
the “slice”, “parseFloat”, and “CSS” Javascript/jQuery methods.
</p>
</div>
I highly recommend these tutorials:
http://blog.themeforest.net/screencasts/jquery-for-absolute-beginners-video-series/
There are a number of resources to learn jQuery (which is completely worth it IMHO). Start here http://docs.jquery.com/Main_Page to read the jQuery documentation. This is a great site for seeing visually what it has to offer:
http://visualjquery.com/1.1.2.html. Manning publications also has a great book which is highly recommended called jQuery in Action. As far as JavaScript libraries are concerned, this one and Prototype are probably the most popular if you're looking to compare jQuery to something else.
I started learning by looking at jQuery extensions to see how other developers work with the jQuery language. It not only helped me to learn jQuery syntax but also taught me how to develop my own extensions.
jQuery worths learning!!! I recommend reading "Learning jQuery" and "jQuery in Action". Both books are great with expalanation and examples. The next step is to actually use it to do something. You will find official http://docs.jquery.com docummentation very useful. I use it as a reference, google it all the time :)
Also "Learning jQuery" blog mensioned by Sean is also very useful. Also jQuery HowTo is also has a great collection of jQuery code snippets.
I haven't seen JQ-Fundamentals - by Rebecca Murphey mentioned anywhere here.
It is a very good book. It also explains the fundamentals of JavaScript required to understand the basics of JQuery.
Jquery.com is well organized and has many great examples. You don't need to buy a book. I found it easy to pickup on the fly by just referencing website's documentation. If you're someone who learns best by doing, I'd suggest this approach.
And yes, it's absolutely worth learning. It'll save you a lot of time and you'll actually look forward to doing JavaScript work!
I use Prototype, which I like. I'm afraid I don't know jQuery, so I can't compare them, but I think Prototype is worth checking out. Their API docs are generally pretty good, in my experience (which certainly helps with learnability).
Hey, I am biased in that I now work with these guys, but Carsonified offers some great resources for people learning and improving their jQuery skill set.
Just next Monday there is an online conference on jQuery featuring John Resig himself - http://carsonified.com/online-conferences/jquery/
Also, they now offer video tutorials via their membership scheme on the Think Vitamin blog,
I know there's a lot of free resource out there, I guess the difference here is the quality of the content you get. hope it's useful!
Below link my be helpful for you if you know SQL (Only css selectors).
http://karticles.com/2011/06/learning-jquery-with-sql-basic-selectors
http://karticles.com/2011/06/learning-jquery-with-sql-attribute-selectors