Elsewhere on the 'Net

You're Fat and I Hate You

James Edwards repeats a few arguments against JavaScript libraries that are never far from my mind. In this case, his annoyance seems to derive from script authors who don't know how their own scripts work; and that's something I wouldn't like, either.

Nonetheless the whole To Use or Not To Use discussion remains extremely complex. I used to speak against libraries at every opportunity; nowadays I'm not so sure any more. But while reading James's piece I again feel myself sliding back to a strict No Libraries approach.

The final word hasn't yet been spoken.

Libraries | Permalink

XPath Overnight

John discusses XPath and its place in JavaScript libraries. Although in general XPath seems to be fast, he's worried about encountering incompatibility problems. These problems might mean that all libraries need both an XPath module and a regular DOM module for the forseeable future, which makes maintenance harder.

Browsers, Libraries | Permalink

Version Targeting and JavaScript Libraries

Drew McLellan takes a look at JavaScript libraries and the versioning switch.

With version targeting, IE7 will never go away. Just as browsers are born, they must also die and make way for the next generation.

That's an interesting thought I haven't yet seen anywhere else. Good argument.

IE, Libraries, Theory | Permalink

JavaScript Library Overview

John Resig's slides from his presentation at the Ajax Experiences. This sort of overview is SO useful.

Libraries | Permalink

JavaScript Libraries: The Big Picture

At XTech in Paris Simon compared the Big Four libraries. Here are his slides. Interesting, altogether.

Libraries | Permalink

Sun’s Project Flair: Ajax without the DOM, CSS, HTML, er wait

Ajaxian warns against the latest round of Ajax bullshit; this time from Sun. Apparently an otherwise sensible, even profoundly accomplished, programmer wants to write a JavaScript "self-supporting Web programming kernel" (whatever thay may be; sounds like marketing-speak to me) that allows people to ignore those nasty, nasty details of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript when writing Ajax applications.

What annoys me most is not so much the idea itself, but the breathless arrogance that speaks from it: I'm an accomplished programmer, so accomplished in fact that I don't have to learn new langauges when I want to do something I can't do in the languages I already speek. I don't want to learn something as easy as HTML/CSS, so I'm going to re-re-re-invent the wheel.

Dion Almaer observes that we should be glad that this latest round of idiocy does not require us to learn a new programming language. The worst thing about it is that he's right.

This message may be a hoax; Ajaxian refers to a cio.in article, which generally refers back to infoworld.com, where nothing can be found about this latest stupidity.

Libraries | Permalink

The sliding scale

Jeremy on the JS library panel at Web 2.0 Expo. I agree with the idea of the gliding scale from libraries meant to make websites to libraries meant to build applications. Needless to say I'll give the latter a wide berth, and I STRONGLY disagree with the idea of using Java to write JavaScript. If you want to write JavaScript, learn JavaScript.

Libraries | Permalink

Rules For JavaScript Library Authors

Dean isn't done yet: here are his rules for library authors. They all seem so simple, but are frequently broken by authors with more technical prowess than common sense.

Libraries | Permalink

Choosing the right JavaScript library

Nicholas Zakas offers some advice on choosing a JavaScript library. As far as I can see Dean's Base scores well on all of these points.

Libraries | Permalink

Yet Another JavaScript Library Without Documentation

Dean Edwards finally unveils his Base library which he already mentioned to me back in June 2006. No documentation, obviously. The library seems to concentrate on getting advanced standards to work in browsers that don't support them yet.

Libraries | Permalink

Future-Proofing JavaScript Libraries

Interesting thoughts on a tricky subject. A bug fix in a browser can cause problems in libraries. In addition, it turns out certain object detections (for instance if (element.getAttribute)) can fail in some browsers. I didn't know that.

Libraries | Permalink

Your own personal library

...and Jeremy again.

Building up your own library, on the other hand, is something I wholeheartedly approve of. I’m pretty sure it’s something that just about every developer does anyway, but it really is a great way of accumulating wisdom… wisdom being knowledge over time.

Agreed. In fact, I'm steadily working on a few useful functions of my own, and although I'll never call it a library (I'm thinking of "utility file"), I'll publish it when I'm ready.

Libraries | Permalink

Scripting Essentials

Dan Webb on JavaScript libraries.

I’m a firm believer, especially with JavaScript, that simple is best. File size / download time arguments aside, the less code you can get away with having the browser parse and execute the better off you are. Less for the browser to do. Less to go wrong. Less to try to understand.

Agreed. Dan continues by listing a few essential functionalities that are so totally useful that it's worth having a library for.

Libraries | Permalink

Too many libraries, not enough librarians

Jeremy's thoughts on JavaScript libraries.

There’s a lot of talk about JavaScript libraries, including a lot of hype and cheerleading, but I think that maybe the discussion is disproportionate to the amount of people actually using libraries.

Spot on. As Jeremy says, a quick and non-scientific poll @media showed that only a minority of JavaScript developers use a library; the others just code by hand.

But JavaScript libraries are cool nowadays and will remain so until the Ajax hype blows over.

Libraries | Permalink

Dear JavaScript Library Developers…

Chris summarises what's wrong with JavaScript libraries today.

Libraries | Permalink

Beware of JavaScript Library Overkill

Ryan Campbell does some benchmark tests with Prototype's Enumerator, and finds it's significantly slower than a traditional, non-library approach.

If basic JavaScript will do the task, then use basic JavaScript.

Benchmarks, Libraries | Permalink

Why Frameworks Suck (redux)

Again a frameworks article. Frameworks *can* suck, is the message.

Libraries | Permalink

Flummoxed By Frameworks

Eric complains: 'I just don’t get all these new-fangled programming frameworks. Is something wrong with me?' No, there's something wrong with the frameworks. Several commenters note that the same problem exists in JavaScript. What goes around comes around. Maybe the latest batch of JS libraries have already passed their zenith.

Libraries | Permalink