Chapter 3
The jQuery Core
WHAT’S IN THIS CHAPTER?
- jQuery Utility Functions
- Unobtrusive JavaScript the Structure of the jQuery Framework
- Understanding the DOM and Events
With a good grasp of JavaScript, you’re now ready to tackle the jQuery core. As you know, it has a small footprint, and rather than a mishmash of functionality it has a coherent base. It provides the capacity to easily select elements, separating the behavior of the document from its structure, as well as the ability to manipulate the DOM on the fly.
In this chapter, you learn about basics of using the jQuery core, about wrapper objects, and briefly take a look under the hood. You’ll find it useful to have some IDE with the ability to collapse blocks of code when perusing through the jQuery source. You’ll also revisit DOM elements and how jQuery handles events.
UNDERSTANDING THE STRUCTURE OF A JQUERY SCRIPT
Some mainstream languages (which shall go unnamed) contain a monolithic “standard library,” which really isn’t so standard. Rather than using a standard library with a common denominator set of tools, several additional modules are added. This results in unnecessarily large downloads, wasted resources, and functionality that you may never use. On the other hand, the creators of jQuery very thoughtfully kept out these kinds of “add on” modules, and kept the jQuery core small and compact. It is, however, extensible through the plugin system, which is covered in Chapter 12.
The jQuery core function, sometimes ...
