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What is a jQuery Plugin?
4:18What are jQuery Plugins, what can they do and why you should be using them.
[SOUND] Hi, I'm Dave.
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Welcome to Using jQuery Plugins.
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jQuery plugins let you add interactive
page elements like sliders,
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pop up photo galleries,
animated navigation bars,
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calculators, calendars, video backgrounds,
and more to your web pages.
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All of this without doing
a lot of programming yourself.
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jQuery plugins leverage
the power of jQuery,
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the most popular JavaScript
library in the world.
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jQuery simplifies common JavaScript
tasks such as selecting and
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manipulating page elements, sending and
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receiving data using Ajax, and adding
engaging visual effects to a web page.
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jQuery is a very powerful tool but,
by itself, it doesn't do anything.
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You have to write your own programs
using jQuery's commands and
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methods to get anything done.
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Fortunately, many talented designers and
developers have already written
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thousands of useful, and sometimes not so
useful, programs that use
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jQuery to improve the user interface and
functionality of websites.
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In this course, I'll show you
how to use a few useful plugins.
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But more importantly, I'll show you the
basic structure that most plugins follow.
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So when you find a new
plugin you want to try out,
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you'll know the basics of
adding it to your webpages.
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In addition, I'll give you a few tips for
finding and selecting plugins.
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But before we do that,
let me show you a few examples so
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you can see what jQuery plugins can do.
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jQuery plugins can be simple or complex.
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They can add just one
new feature to a page or
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dozens of features to an entire website.
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J calculator is a simple jQuery
plugin that adds a calculator
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to a text input field.
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Click in the field and
a basic calculator appears.
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You can add numbers together, multiply,
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subtract, and divide and
the results appear in the form field.
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The jQuery adaptive modal plugin makes
it easy to create visually exciting
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modal dialog boxes.
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You can turn any link into a trigger for
opening a dialog box on a page.
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The modal dialogue can
include form fields, and
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even content that gets
loaded from another webpage.
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If you have really long
lists of information,
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like a directory of employees,
businesses, services,
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you can use the jQuery ListNav
plugin to make it easy to
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locate items that start
with a particular letter.
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When you hover over a letter,
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the plugin even shows you the number
of items that begin with that letter.
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If you really wanna add
excitement to a web page,
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the Vide plugin lets you add video
backgrounds to any web page.
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Another common user interface
device is the Lightbox.
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There are many versions of this plugin,
but
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the original Lightbox plugin
is still an excellent choice.
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Click an image and
a larger version appears on the page.
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You can group images together to
create a set that users navigate by
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clicking forward and back buttons.
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But plugins aren't just limited
to single effects like these.
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Some plugins offer a wide set of features
intended to simplify building web
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applications.
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JQuery UI is a sister project of jQuery
itself and provides a complete framework
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of user interface widgets,
effects, and interactions.
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It makes it easy for you to add drag and
drop functionality, add tabbed panels,
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a date picker, dialogue boxes,
and a lot more.
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In fact, it gives you many of the tools
you'll need to build highly interactive
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web applications.
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The plugins we've just
looked at are all free, but
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not all plugins come without a price.
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In some cases, you'll find plugins
that offer a simpler free version and
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a fancier more complete
version that costs money.
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There are literally thousands
of plugins to choose from.
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In the next video, I'll talk about
how to find good jQuery plugins.
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See you there.
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