Learning jQuery 1.3: Better Interaction Design and Web Development with Simple JavaScript Techniques

Better Interaction Design and Web Development with Simple JavaScript Techniques

• An introduction to jQuery that requires minimal programming experience
• Detailed solutions to specific client-side problems
• For web designers to create interactive elements for their designs
• For developers to create the best user interface for their web applications
• Packed with great examples, code, and clear explanations
• Revised and updated version of the first book to help you learn jQuery

In Detail

To build interesting, interactive sites, developers are turning to JavaScript libraries such as jQuery to automate common tasks and simplify complicated ones. Because many web developers have more experience with HTML and CSS than with JavaScript, the library's design lends itself to a quick start for designers with little programming experience. Experienced programmers will also be aided by its conceptual consistency.

Revised and updated for version 1.3 of jQuery, this book teaches you the basics of jQuery for adding interactions and animations to your pages. Even if previous attempts at writing JavaScript have left you baffled, this book will guide you past the pitfalls associated with AJAX, events, effects, and advanced JavaScript language features.

In this book, the authors share their knowledge, experience, and enthusiasm about jQuery to help you get the most from the library and to make your web applications shine. The book introduces jQuery and shows how you can write a functioning jQuery program in just three lines of code. It then guides you through CSS selectors and shows how to enhance the basic event handling mechanisms to give them a more elegant syntax. You will then learn to add impact to your actions through a set of simple visual effects and also to create, copy, reassemble, and embellish content using jQuery's DOM modification methods. You will also learn to send and retrieve information with AJAX methods. The book will then step you through many detailed, real-world examples and even equip you to extend the jQuery library itself with your own plug-ins.

What you will learn from this book?

This book will give you the tools you need to be on the cutting edge of the web development community. With these techniques at your disposal, you can:

• Use selectors to get anything you want from a page
• Make things happen on your page with events
• Add flair to your actions with animation effects
• Change your page on command with DOM manipulation
• Use AJAX to get the most out of server-side code
• Transform drab, static information containers into beautiful, dynamic tables
• Breathe new life into online forms
• Create dynamic shufflers, rotators, and galleries
• Get started with official jQuery plug-ins
• Customize by writing your own jQuery plug-ins

Approach

This book begins with a tutorial to jQuery, followed by an examination of common, real-world client-side problems, and solutions to each of them making it an invaluable resource for answers to all your jQuery questions.

Who this book is written for?

This book is for web designers who want to create interactive elements for their designs, and for developers who want to create the best user interface for their web applications. Basic JavaScript programming knowledge is required. You will need to know the basics of HTML and CSS, and should be comfortable with the syntax of JavaScript. No knowledge of jQuery is assumed, nor is experience with any other JavaScript libraries required.

Jonathan Chaffer

Jonathan Chaffer is the Chief Technology Officer of Structure Interactive, an interactive agency located in Grand Rapids, Michigan. There he oversees web development projects using a wide range of technologies, and continues to collaborate on day-to-day programming tasks as well.

In the open-source community, Jonathan has been very active in the Drupal CMS project, which has adopted jQuery as its JavaScript framework of choice. He is the creator of the Content Construction Kit, a popular module for managing structured content on Drupal sites. He is responsible for major overhauls of Drupal's menu system and developer API reference.

Jonathan lives in Grand Rapids with his wife, Jennifer.

Karl Swedberg

Karl Swedberg is a web developer at Structure Interactive in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he spends much of his time implementing design with a focus on "web standards"--semantic HTML, well-mannered CSS, and unobtrusive JavaScript.

Before his current love affair with web development, Karl worked as a copy editor, a high-school English teacher, and a coffee house owner. His fascination with technology began in the early 1990s when he worked at Microsoft in Redmond, Washington, and it has continued unabated ever since.

Karl's other obsessions include photography, karate, English grammar, and fatherhood. He lives in Grand Rapids with his wife, Sara, and his two children, Benjamin and Lucia.