Javascript Library

[shapper]

Hello,

I would like to use a javascript library to simplify my coding
process.
I know a few: JQuery, Dojo, Yahoo UI, ...

Which one do you advice me to use?

Thanks,
Miguel

[Rozzy]

On Dec 5, 9:47 am, beegee <[e-mail]:

On Oct 30, 1:46 pm, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

What would be your recommendation? I see some possibilities:

1. Use a freely-available library that isn't perfect, but has lots of
examples, speeds up development, and doesn't appear to break in any
cases
2. Write everything from scratch, which might be lower quality than
the libraries and take too long
3. Hire a competent developer to write everything from scratch, which
again might take too long and may not be an option financially
4. Make a post to comp.lang.javascript asking which library to use and
be told that they all suck, and awesome library code exists but you
can't have it.
5. ???

In a real case like this, how would you recommend that people proceed?

Matt Kruse

I have looked at all the libraries that have been mentioned here plus
mootools and scriptaculous. I use YUI now because a.) I know exactly
what it will give me (trees, menus, dialogs, and a pretty nice AJAX
wrapper and most importantly, it will not obfuscate the javascript
language) b.) people on this group haven't totally dissed it.

I am unable to see what the other libraries will give me. Could you
list (for me and the OP) what specific benefits jQuery, for example
will give me. I'm not angling here. If there is a great benefit I am
missing then I will switch over and damn the obfuscation and
"terrible" code.

Bob

Your right, I don't know anything about Javascript, I don't even know
what it is? I just pretend like someone who knows everything about
Javascript, but really doesn't. Wait a minute, that kinda of sounds
like you, I told you we were the same

[David Mark]

On Dec 5, 9:55 am, Rozzy <[e-mail]:

On Dec 5, 9:47 am, beegee <[e-mail]:

On Oct 30, 1:46 pm, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

What would be your recommendation? I see some possibilities:

1. Use a freely-available library that isn't perfect, but has lots of
examples, speeds up development, and doesn't appear to break in any
cases
2. Write everything from scratch, which might be lower quality than
the libraries and take too long
3. Hire a competent developer to write everything from scratch, which
again might take too long and may not be an option financially
4. Make a post to comp.lang.javascript asking which library to use and
be told that they all suck, and awesome library code exists but you
can't have it.
5. ???

In a real case like this, how would you recommend that people proceed?

Matt Kruse

I have looked at all the libraries that have been mentioned here plus
mootools and scriptaculous. I use YUI now because a.) I know exactly
what it will give me (trees, menus, dialogs, and a pretty nice AJAX
wrapper and most importantly, it will not obfuscate the javascript
language) b.) people on this group haven't totally dissed it.

I am unable to see what the other libraries will give me. Could you
list (for me and the OP) what specific benefits jQuery, for example
will give me. I'm not angling here. If there is a great benefit I am
missing then I will switch over and damn the obfuscation and
"terrible" code.

Bob

Your right, I don't know anything about Javascript, I don't even know

Your (sic) right, as evidenced by this thread:

http://groups.google.com/group/JavaS...395dcf68e5d57a

what it is? I just pretend like someone who knows everything about

Yep.

http://groups.google.com/group/JavaS...d62731ea83bb61

Salient quote:

"...except a textnode is not a valid element and
therefore cannot be referenced as the firstChild."

-Rozzy

Javascript, but really doesn't. Wait a minute, that kinda of sounds
like you, I told you we were the same

Never me.

[David Mark]

On Dec 5, 9:47 am, beegee <[e-mail]:

On Oct 30, 1:46 pm, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

What would be your recommendation? I see some possibilities:

1. Use a freely-available library that isn't perfect, but has lots of
examples, speeds up development, and doesn't appear to break in any
cases
2. Write everything from scratch, which might be lower quality than
the libraries and take too long
3. Hire a competent developer to write everything from scratch, which
again might take too long and may not be an option financially
4. Make a post to comp.lang.javascript asking which library to use and
be told that they all suck, and awesome library code exists but you
can't have it.
5. ???

In a real case like this, how would you recommend that people proceed?

Matt Kruse

I have looked at all the libraries that have been mentioned here plus
mootools and scriptaculous. I use YUI now because a.) I know exactly
what it will give me (trees, menus, dialogs, and a pretty nice AJAX
wrapper and most importantly, it will not obfuscate the javascript
language) b.) people on this group haven't totally dissed it.

Parts of it have been panned recently. Their tree widget is bloated
and uses nested tables IIRC. And certainly there are decent stand-
alone menu and "dialog" (assuming you mean centered elements with
backdrops) scripts out there that don't require half of the YUI
framework to function. By coincidence, I posted examples of both here
recently. They are both available from the Google Code repository
(search the group for my name + Google and you should find the links.)

>
I am unable to see what the other libraries will give me. Could you

A massive headache every time one of the handful of browsers they
claim to support comes out with an update.

list (for me and the OP) what specific benefits jQuery, for example

jQuery is less than worthless, even with the recent patches that
addressed a few of the concerns pointed out in this thread. It is a
major liability and will remain one as its developers are mostly
buffoons. Avoid it at all costs.

will give me. I'm not angling here. If there is a great benefit I am
missing then I will switch over and damn the obfuscation and
"terrible" code.

What sort of strategy is that? Terrible code leads to terrible
Websites. There's no benefit in that. Not to mention that the
greatest perceived benefit of jQuery is its CSS selector queries,
which are largely useless and lead to ridiculous code that constantly
creates and discards objects, fails to test if queried elements
actually exist and generally shields the author from ever learning
anything about competent browser scripting. It's fool's gold.

[Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn]

Rozzy wrote:

[...]
Don't worry David, I got your back! I'll put these jerks in their
place [...]

Please do not feed the troll.

[Rozzy]

On Dec 5, 6:28 pm, Thomas 'PointedEars' Lahn <[e-mail]>
wrote:

Rozzy wrote:

[...]
Don't worry David, I got your back! I'll put these jerks in their
place [...]

Please do not feed the troll.

Yeah you got it, but the problem is that he can't sit back and say
nothing knowing hes been whipped since the beginning. Somebody got the
best of him and its eating him up inside. I scouted you well.

[Matt Kruse]

On Dec 6, 10:39 am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

a. reduce the time taken to code repeating tasks.

That saved time goes out the window as soon as something breaks. As
we were discussing jQuery, that could easily be a daily occurrence.

Hypotheticals are fun, but of little practical value. Until you have
real examples of things breaking regularly because of using jQuery,
you're just trying to incite fear using scare tactics. Surely if you
are so convinced that the maintenance of anything that uses jQuery
would be a nightmare you would have _some_ experiences of yourself or
others to point to.

I should check other groups for your posts. Surely you're arguing
somewhere that planes will start falling out of the sky, because they
are really heavy, and everyone knows that heavy things fall, so a
disaster is just waiting to happen once the wind patterns change a
little bit in a way that wasn't accounted for. It's so obvious. Anyone
who thinks otherwise is delusional. Duh.

b. make the site maintainable by other developers.

Same problem. There is nothing easy to maintain about jQuery. It
will always be a disaster waiting to happen.

If this isn't the mantra of a zealot with no ability to see beyond
what he knows and uses, I don't know what is.

I'm certainly not going to argue for jQuery
though. I was hoping to hear from someone as to what they perceive as
its value.

I can save you some time there. It has no value. As a liability, it
is worse than having nothing at all. If you do hear from someone that
perceives it has value (few in this group), you can safely dismiss it
as delusion.

Blah, blah blah.

Ignore reality in favor of the fantasy world that you create to make
yourself feel better. You should start a religion while you're at it.

Matt Kruse

[David Mark]

On Dec 6, 11:55 am, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

On Dec 6, 10:39 am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

a. reduce the time taken to code repeating tasks.

That saved time goes out the window as soon as something breaks. As
we were discussing jQuery, that could easily be a daily occurrence.

Hypotheticals are fun, but of little practical value. Until you have
real examples of things breaking regularly because of using jQuery,

You apparently learned nothing from this lengthy thread.

you're just trying to incite fear using scare tactics. Surely if you
are so convinced that the maintenance of anything that uses jQuery
would be a nightmare you would have _some_ experiences of yourself or
others to point to.

The only experience you should need to know that there are major
problems with jQuery is to look at its code. Much of it forked based
on a meaningless value, which its author thinks indicates MSIE.

[snip nonsense]

>

b. make the site maintainable by other developers.

Same problem. There is nothing easy to maintain about jQuery. It
will always be a disaster waiting to happen.

If this isn't the mantra of a zealot with no ability to see beyond
what he knows and uses, I don't know what is.

Apparently you don't know anything about browser scripting. That much
is clear. Ironically, you took many of my arguments against jQuery
and ran with them, resulting in recent patches. Far too few patches
of course, but that says something about the value of my input and
your perception of it. The contrast between your arguments here and
your input to the jQuery developers would seem to indicate a split
personality.

[snip more nonsense]

Seek professional help.

[Matt Kruse]

On Dec 6, 11:34 am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

The only experience you should need to know that there are major
problems with jQuery is to look at its code. Much of it forked based
on a meaningless value, which its author thinks indicates MSIE.

Which doesn't necessarily correspond to problems in use or
maintenance, which you are claiming.

Where is your personal experience or anecdotes from others that show
what a maintenance hell jQuery is? Oh, wait, you have none? Because
it's all speculation, and you're crossing your fingers just hoping
that something bad does indeed happen. I'm sure it bothers you that
you have no real cases where the use of jQuery has caused lots of
problems, but you can find _many_ real cases where it has provided a
lot of value to a lot of different people. Including small mom-and-pop
operations like Google.

Ironically, you took many of my arguments against jQuery
and ran with them, resulting in recent patches.

I'm not aware of the patches, but I did look over the code that you
critiqued and offered my own version of it. There were obviously some
similarities in our criticisms, and most of your criticisms were
obviously very valid. Good job. I agree with much of your technical
analysis of javascript, but I disagree with many of your conclusions.
I'm fine with that.

The contrast between your arguments here and
your input to the jQuery developers would seem to indicate a split
personality.

Not at all. I still use jQuery and I find it extremely valuable in the
cases where I use it. It needs to improve, especially if I am to use
it on public sites. I am confident that it will improve over time and
come closer to the standard I think it can reach. I have no plans to
abandon it.

Seek professional help.

Thank you for your valuable input.

Matt Kruse

[Richard Cornford]

Randy Webb wrote:

Peter Michaux said the following on 12/4/2007 3:16 PM:
<snip>

>Some people strive for excellence and constantly improvement.
Others are happy with mediocrity because it is good enough
for everyone else.

I think you failed to catch the sarcasm and irony in it.

And of course sarcasm is a much better contribution to debate than
reasoned argument. Not least because it puts a layer of camouflage over
its asserted 'truths' that could keep them form being subject to
specific examination for their validity.

The implied 'truths' in the sarcastic expression are:-

1. That JQuery works in 99% or all browsers. Which would be a difficult
position to sustain independently given the issues with browser
statistics in general and the very large numbers of 'browsers' that are
known to exist.

2. That creating cross-browser code is significantly more expensive than
not doing so. Which is a judgment best made by people who can create
cross-browser code (as anyone else will be guessing at what would be
involved and/or factoring in the cost of their learning how to undertake
the task).

3. That John Resig is an "expert", regardless of how amateurish his code
looks, how outdated the techniques he uses are, how uninformed his
design decisions appear to have been, or how incapable he appears to be
to state reasoned justifications for the actions he has taken.

4. That "huge corporations" like Microsoft, Google, Enron or IBM could
never do anything wrong, presumably by virtue of their being "huge
corporations".

5. That individual who "practically invented the language" (whoever they
were intended to be in this context) must then know how to use it. The
real truth of which was highlighted when I visited Berendan Eich's (this
individual who literally invented the language) ES4 roadmap updates page
yesterday (

<URL:
http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/roadm...d_opinion.html >

) to be presented with IE 6 popping up its error dialog containing the
words "line: 260, Char:1, Error: Syntax error". In javascript/browser
scripting terms that is about as bad as it gets. (Granted I doubt that
was Berendan Eich's personal fault/responsibility (rather a general
f**k-up in the script authoring/QA for the blog software), but still
there it is).

Richard.

[David Mark]

On Dec 6, 1:29 pm, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

On Dec 6, 11:34 am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

The only experience you should need to know that there are major
problems with jQuery is to look at its code. Much of it forked based
on a meaningless value, which its author thinks indicates MSIE.

Which doesn't necessarily correspond to problems in use or
maintenance, which you are claiming.

Of course it does. All of its browser sniffing does. Where have you
been for the last ten years? You claim to have spent at least some of
that time scripting browsers. Have you learned anything from the
experience?

>
Where is your personal experience or anecdotes from others that show
what a maintenance hell jQuery is? Oh, wait, you have none? Because
it's all speculation, and you're crossing your fingers just hoping
that something bad does indeed happen. I'm sure it bothers you that

I couldn't care less what happenes with jQuery or any other library,
unless it happens to be running the current page in my browser.

you have no real cases where the use of jQuery has caused lots of
problems, but you can find _many_ real cases where it has provided a

Go read your own re-hashing of my arguments in the jQuery developer
group as you have apparently forgotten everything you said.

lot of value to a lot of different people. Including small mom-and-pop
operations like Google.

How many times are you going to use Google as an example? Everybody
knows they employ some of the worst Web developers in history. The
quality of their JavaScript is notoriously bad. What makes you think
they make good decisions in that area?

>

Ironically, you took many of my arguments against jQuery
and ran with them, resulting in recent patches.

I'm not aware of the patches, but I did look over the code that you
critiqued and offered my own version of it. There were obviously some
similarities in our criticisms, and most of your criticisms were

That's an odd way to put it. You took what I posted and ran with it.
By your own admission, you were happily using this library for however
long, completely oblivious to its time bombs. You likely would have
continued using it until one day, Firefox or Opera or one of the other
two browsers the stupid thing supports updated and broke some or all
of your applications.

obviously very valid. Good job. I agree with much of your technical
analysis of javascript, but I disagree with many of your conclusions.
I'm fine with that.

You just seem to struggling to accept the conclusions as they
invalidate many of your own mistaken beliefs. Some fragment of your
personality gets it, else you wouldn't have argued tirelessly to have
various bits of browser sniffing (among other things) removed from
jQuery. BTW, you have a long way to go if you really want to salvage
that derelict. Good luck.

>

The contrast between your arguments here and
your input to the jQuery developers would seem to indicate a split
personality.

Not at all. I still use jQuery and I find it extremely valuable in the
cases where I use it. It needs to improve, especially if I am to use
it on public sites. I am confident that it will improve over time and

But you and others like you are constantly recommending it to people
who build public sites. Do you not see why that is inappropriate?
That's one of my biggest complaints about the jQuery muppets. They
argue that they designed something for three browsers and don't care
about the others, but fail to understand that such a design falls way
short of what a public Website requires, recommending their
monstrosity to anybody and everybody, with an almost religious zeal.

come closer to the standard I think it can reach. I have no plans to
abandon it.

Great.

[dhtmlkitchen]

On Dec 6 2007, 9:34*am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

On Dec 6, 11:55 am, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

On Dec 6, 10:39 am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

ironically, you took many of my arguments against jQuery

I would have liked to have seen more discussion for detecting support
for computedStyles; the bug John mentioned.

When adding a hack for something like getComputedStyle, it would be
good style to add a comment:

if( cantGetComputedStyle( element ) {
// XXX: Safari 2 returns null when element has display: none;
...
// XXX: Safari 3 returns empty strings for getPropertyValue...
}
@John
<snip>

Considering that IE is going to be backwards compatible for, most
likely, many many years to come, I'm not worried. When the year 2031
arrives, jQuery can, and will adapt.

Providing a case where the code expects a browser to have incorrect
behavior makes it hard for that browser to change. It also makes the
code require more frequent maintenance for user-agents that change. IE
needs a reason to change; a failure case. Chris Wilson talks about
this. Microsoft can't break the web by neglecting current sites.

[dhtmlkitchen]

On Dec 6 2007, 4:15*pm, David Mark <[e-mail]:

On Dec 6, 1:29 pm, Matt Kruse <[e-mail]:

On Dec 6, 11:34 am, David Mark <[e-mail]:

The only experience you should need to know that there are major
problems with jQuery is to look at its code. *Much of it forked based
on a meaningless value, which its author thinks indicates MSIE.

Which doesn't necessarily correspond to problems in use or
maintenance, which you are claiming.

Of course it does. *All of its browser sniffing does. *Where have you
been for the last ten years? *You claim to have spent at least some of
that time scripting browsers. *Have you learned anything from the
experience?

Where is your personal experience or anecdotes from others that show
what a maintenance hell jQuery is? Oh, wait, you have none? Because
it's all speculation, and you're crossing your fingers just hoping
that something bad does indeed happen. I'm sure it bothers you that

I couldn't care less what happenes with jQuery or any other library,
unless it happens to be running the current page in my browser.

you have no real cases where the use of jQuery has caused lots of
problems, but you can find _many_ real cases where it has provided a

Go read your own re-hashing of my arguments in the jQuery developer
group as you have apparently forgotten everything you said.

lot of value to a lot of different people. Including small mom-and-pop
operations like Google.

How many times are you going to use Google as an example? *Everybody
knows they employ some of the worst Web developers in history. *The
quality of their JavaScript is notoriously bad. *What makes you think
they make good decisions in that area?

Ironically, you took many of my arguments against jQuery
and ran with them, resulting in recent patches.

I'm not aware of the patches, but I did look over the code that you
critiqued and offered my own version of it. There were obviously some
similarities in our criticisms, and most of your criticisms were

That's an odd way to put it. *You took what I posted and ran with it.
By your own admission, you were happily using this library for however
long, completely oblivious to its time bombs. *You likely would have
continued using it until one day, Firefox or Opera or one of the other
two browsers the stupid thing supports updated and broke some or all
of your applications.

obviously very valid. Good job. I agree with much of your technical
analysis of javascript, but I disagree with many of your conclusions.
I'm fine with that.

You just seem to struggling to accept the conclusions as they
invalidate many of your own mistaken beliefs. *Some fragment of your
personality gets it, else you wouldn't have argued tirelessly to have
various bits of browser sniffing (among other things) removed from
jQuery. *BTW, you have a long way to go if you really want to salvage
that derelict. *Good luck.

The contrast between your arguments here and
your input to the jQuery developers would seem to indicate a split
personality.

Not at all. I still use jQuery and I find it extremely valuable in the
cases where I use it. It needs to improve, especially if I am to use
it on public sites. I am confident that it will improve over time and

But you and others like you are constantly recommending it to people
who build public sites. *Do you not see why that is inappropriate?
That's one of my biggest complaints about the jQuery muppets. *They
argue that they designed something for three browsers and don't care
about the others, but fail to understand that such a design falls way
short of what a public Website requires, recommending their
monstrosity to anybody and everybody, with an almost religious zeal.

come closer to the standard I think it can reach. I have no plans to
abandon it.

Great.