jQuery Essentials

Key Features

• Build dynamic websites efficiently without any performance issues
• Learn to use existing jQuery plugins and or write your own for your websites
• This is the most up-to-date book on the market at the moment, packed with detailed explanations and real-world examples

Book Description

JQuery is still the most popular JavaScript library. It is used in over 60% of the top websites on the Internet. It was written to make DOM manipulation (so, moving things around a web page) easier for developers. It acts through JavaScript to ascribe HTML elements to the DOM attributes. Because it is a library of predefined functions, all you need to start using jQuery is a working knowledge of the syntax and a reference for the functions available to you.

This practical guide shows you how to make the most of jQuery to boost the performance of your websites and applications. We start off with a quick glance through the basics of JQuery, followed by the explanation of JQuery selectors, filters, and DOM element manipulation. After this, you will learn how events and animations can be used to create and design beautiful and user-friendly sites. Next, you will be familiarized with Ajax functions to help you send and receive data from your server. Finally, we'll walk you through using built-in plugins and eventually create your own plugins for your websites.

By the end of this book, you will be able to to build robust and efficient websites successfully using JQuery.

What you will learn

• Quickly find and modify HTML DOM elements
• Use animation to add flair to your site
• Create your own events to decouple your application
• Measure the performance of your website's JavaScript
• Write unit tests to ensure that your application is behaving correctly
• Use plugins to to save reinventing the wheel and enhance your site quickly
• Use client-side validation on forms to prevent your users from sending bad data to your application
• Write your own jQuery plugins in order to encapsulate your company's business logic

About the Author

Troy Miles, a.k.a. the Rockncoder, began writing games in assembly language for early computers, such as the Apple II, Vic20, C64, and the IBM PC, over 35 years ago. Currently, he spends his days writing web apps for a Southern California-based automotive valuation and information company. During the nights and weekends, he can usually be found writing cool apps for mobile and Web or teaching other developers how to do that. He likes to post interesting code nuggets on his blog at http://therockncoder.com and videos on his YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/user/rockncoder. He can be reached at rockncoder@gmail.com.

Table of Contents

1. jQuery Part by Part
2. jQuery Selectors and Filters
3. Manipulating the DOM
4. Events
5. Making Your Site Snazzy with jQuery
6. Better Forms with jQuery
7. Talking to Your Server
8. Writing Code that You can Read Later
9. Faster jQuery
10. Benefiting from the Work of Others with Plugins