[Rails-core] Default JavaScript library
Daniel Schierbeck
time has passed, and that the landscape has changed.
Currently, Prototype is the default option in Rails. While switching
to jQuery is pretty easy, it's not as easy as not having to switch at
all, and this being Rails and all, our expectations in the area of
rock-solid defaults are high. I'd like to bring up some arguments in
favor of switching the default to jQuery.
1. It is my feeling that the vast majority of the Rails community use
jQuery exclusively.
2. jQuery has a vast community of its own, and a multitude of
plugins.
2. Yehuda Katz.
In all honesty, it's probably the first argument that carries the most
weight: if the vast majority of developers use jQuery, Rails should
embrace it as the new default, seeing as it's the *preferred* one now.
Now, I may be wrong about the number of jQuery vs. Prototype users,
but I'd be surprised if I was.
I hope I'll get at least a few responses. I can entirely understand if
you've got personal reasons to prefer Prototype and all, its long
history side by side with Rails and all, but Rails 3.1 may be a good
time reflect on whether it's still the best choice.
Best regards,
Daniel Schierbeck
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Jeff
wrote:
> time has passed, and that the landscape has changed.
>
> Currently, Prototype is the default option in Rails. While switching
> to jQuery is pretty easy, it's not as easy as not having to switch at
> all, and this being Rails and all, our expectations in the area of
> rock-solid defaults are high. I'd like to bring up some arguments in
> favor of switching the default to jQuery.
>
> 1. It is my feeling that the vast majority of the Rails community use
> jQuery exclusively.
> 2. jQuery has a vast community of its own, and a multitude of
> plugins.
> 2. Yehuda Katz.
>
default values for a lot of things, including the default javascript
library.
Jeff
Rodrigo Rosenfeld Rosas
> On May 24, 10:54 am, Daniel Schierbeck<daniel.schierb...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi there, sorry to bring this topic up yet again, but I feel that some
>> time has passed, and that the landscape has changed.
>>
>> Currently, Prototype is the default option in Rails. While switching
>> to jQuery is pretty easy, it's not as easy as not having to switch at
>> all, and this being Rails and all, our expectations in the area of
>> rock-solid defaults are high. I'd like to bring up some arguments in
>> favor of switching the default to jQuery.
>>
>> 1. It is my feeling that the vast majority of the Rails community use
>> jQuery exclusively.
>>
> Mine too.
>
>
>> 2. jQuery has a vast community of its own, and a multitude of
>> plugins.
>> 2. Yehuda Katz.
>>
>>
> I agree, and think that Rails 3 is a good opportunity to offer new
> default values for a lot of things, including the default javascript
> library.
>
> Jeff
>
Rodrigo
Ryan Bigg
Ryan Bigg / Radar
On 25/05/2010, at 6:17, Rodrigo Rosenfeld Rosas <rr.r...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> co...@googlegroups.com.
Amol Hatwar
Norman Clarke
with Rails as Prototype, it should be easy to determine which one
people are using more often and then make that the default for 3.1.
I'm also pretty convinced jQuery will come out far ahead.
Yehuda Katz
Allen Madsen
be easy to pick either. Maybe a flag on the rails command like -d for
the database. You could do something like:
rails myapp -j=jquery
Allen Madsen
http://www.allenmadsen.com
Mateo Murphy
On 25-May-10, at 10:54 AM, Allen Madsen wrote:
> I don't particularly care which is the default, but I think it should
> be easy to pick either. Maybe a flag on the rails command like -d for
> the database. You could do something like:
>
> rails myapp -j=jquery
>
> Allen Madsen
> http://www.allenmadsen.com
I think ideally, there should be -o and -t options for picking your
orm and test framework at creation time as well
Paul Sponagl
yes - it should be easy to select, but one has to differentiate between first time users and heavy users.
first time users might not be able to choose between various types of orm, jslib, testlib ... and so they will choose the default.
i think well thought defaults are important as they will lay the foundation of first projects and will bind first time users to at least a few months to the libs.
Paul
!DSPAM:4bfbf17159888338217025!
Daniel Schierbeck
while retaining the possibility of opting out is the way to go. Having
a command line switch that toggles different implementations may be
nice, but it also incurs a much bigger maintenance work, as the sheer
number of combinations between different components becomes vast.
Unless this is something someone wants to maintain, I suggest removing
the non-default bindings from the Rails repo and putting it in a
plugin.
Cheers,
Daniel Schierbeck
Karl
It's tough to get people to switch, so I think you should have a
choice. Ship with both perhaps.
But I think the syntax and philosophy of jQuery is more similar to
Ruby than Protoype is similar to Ruby. I think it would be easier for
new people to pick up jQuery than Prototype, but both are very easy to
get started with.
Karl
On May 24, 8:54 am, Daniel Schierbeck <daniel.schierb...@gmail.com>
wrote:
Amos King
Amos King
http://dirtyInformation.com
http://github.com/Adkron
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gezope
with setting up Rails with a workable database... so it won't be fun,
if a beginner has to pay attention also for choosing the better JS
library - while maybe he doesn't have any idea about Js at all!
Anyway: jQuery is much better, and also very good for beinners; for
example I made half that much basic mistakes than with Prottype! ;) Of
course I'm not the only beginner - so it is just an opinion.
üdv,
Zoli
On May 25, 5:28 pm, Paul Sponagl <p...@sponagl.de> wrote:
> -/+1
>
> yes - it should be easy to select, but one has to differentiate between first time users and heavy users.
>
> first time users might not be able to choose between various types of orm, jslib, testlib ... and so they will choose the default.
>
> i think well thought defaults are important as they will lay the foundation of first projects and will bind first time users to at least a few months to the libs.
>
> Am 25.05.2010 um 17:12 schrieb Mateo Murphy:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On 25-May-10, at 10:54 AM, Allen Madsen wrote:
>
> >> I don't particularly care which is the default, but I think it should
> >> be easy to pick either. Maybe a flag on the rails command like -d for
> >> the database. You could do something like:
>
> >> rails myapp -j=jquery
>
> >> Allen Madsen
> >>http://www.allenmadsen.com
>
> > +1
>
> > I think ideally, there should be -o and -t options for picking your orm and test framework at creation time as well
>
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Xavier Noria
<daniel.s...@gmail.com> wrote:
> 1. It is my feeling that the vast majority of the Rails community use
> jQuery exclusively.
This report from RailsLab says jRails is used by about 16% of RPM users:
It could be the case that some switch to jQuery without jRails, but I
wouldn't expect that to be a significant percent. In any case, a 16%
in that particular sample does not seem to support that perception.
-- fxn
PS: I you match gems and plugins, numbers say Mislav is the king :).
Albert Llop
16% is a real indicator of the usage of jQuery in Rails projects.
At least to me it seems like the problem of having Prototype as
default affects mostly to new people. Advanced users will just install
jRails and use jQuery. New people might find themselves thinking they
nave to use Prototype to work with Rails, or other harmful situations.
I believe that if the default lib is the most used everywhere these
negative situations will happen less often.
Hope it helps.
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Yehuda Katz
in their Rails apps. In every case, close to 100% of the room raises
their hands. jRails is a replacement for the Rails helpers only; I
personally know a huge number of people who use jQuery with jRails.
In short jRails usage != jQuery usage
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Xavier Noria
> Projects using jQuery dont necessarily use jRails so I dont think that 16%
> is a real indicator of the usage of jQuery in Rails projects.
As I said, I don't expect that to be a significant percent.
> At least to me it seems like the problem of having Prototype as default
> affects mostly to new people. Advanced users will just install jRails and
> use jQuery. New people might find themselves thinking they nave to use
> Prototype to work with Rails, or other harmful situations. I believe that if
> the default lib is the most used everywhere these negative situations will
> happen less often.
That's a different story. What the 16% tells in my view is that you
can't include (1) among the reasons for advocating a switch in the
default.
Jarkko Laine
> At every talk I give at a conference, I ask whether people use jQuery
> in their Rails apps. In every case, close to 100% of the room raises
> their hands.
In all fairness, I think that's a bit misleading question. I raised my hand when you asked it in Frozen Rails, but I would also have raised my hand if you'd had asked the same question about Prototype.
//jarkko
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Check out my latest book, Unobtrusive Prototype, fresh off the Peepcode oven:
http://peepcode.com/products/unobtrusive-prototype-js
Yehuda Katz
I can devise some experiments to prove that, but I have seen no
evidence in my travels of a huge amount of people using anything else.
I freely agree that people use Protoype, MooTools and Dojo. The number
of people who do so, in my estimation, is quite small.
Also, to be clear, people who don't write JavaScript at all but just
use the Rails helpers would be unaffected by a change in defaults. I
would consider them N/As rather than "prototype users"
Xavier Noria
> The idea that 16% of Rails users use jQuery is divorced from reality.
But you are talking perceptions, and the sample talks numbers.
Of course 16% has to be taken with some margins, but you can't deny it
makes difficult to claim that the vast majority of Rails developers
use jQuery exclusively, which was the claim in (1). That is a strong
claim! (1 was originally stated as a feeling not a fact, that's fine).
If the percent had been 84% then there would be no doubt about it,
right? But < 20%... dubious.
But it turns out the 84% seems to support that the vast majority are
using Prototype, no matter which is our termometer.
Hey, I am not saying people can't advocate jQuery because of a series
of reasons. I am only raising a flag about this claim about the
perceived user base.
Mateo Murphy
On 27-May-10, at 11:32 AM, Yehuda Katz wrote:
> The idea that 16% of Rails users use jQuery is divorced from reality.
> I can devise some experiments to prove that, but I have seen no
> evidence in my travels of a huge amount of people using anything else.
> I freely agree that people use Protoype, MooTools and Dojo. The number
> of people who do so, in my estimation, is quite small.
I think in reality, most rails developers end up using both; prototype
because it's the default, and jquery because of the large library of
plugins. I do think that supports a move to using jquery as default,
despite preferring prototype myself.
Neeraj Singh
patch can easily be created.
# create a demo app with prototype javascript
# in this way current behavior is not changed
> rails init demo
# create a demo app with latest stable jquery
# http://github.com/rails/jquery-ujs should have a jquery-versions.txt
file which lists all the stable releases of jquery. That file will be
referred
# on runtime and the latest stable version will be found which would
be 1.4.2 as of this writing
> rails init demo -j=jquery
# create a demo app with jquery version 1.4.1
> rails init demo -j=jquery:1.4.1
# create a demo app with mootools version 1.2.4
> rails init demo -j=mootools:1.2.4
Once this kind of api is in place then I don't care what is the
default JavaScript library that ships with rails.
Thoughts?
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Andy Jeffries
> makes difficult to claim that the vast majority of Rails developers
> use jQuery exclusively, which was the claim in (1). That is a strong
> claim! (1 was originally stated as a feeling not a fact, that's fine).
>
> If the percent had been 84% then there would be no doubt about it,
> right? But < 20%... dubious.
>
> But it turns out the 84% seems to support that the vast majority are
> using Prototype, no matter which is our termometer.
I completely disagree, just because people don't use jrails, doesn't
mean they're a prototype user. I generally bring in jQuery manually
and delete all the prototype cruft from my projects, but I then write
my own jQuery code to do specifically what I want, ignoring Rails
helpers.
You can't assume that 16% jRails = 16% jQuery - it would be true if
that was the only way of using jQuery with Rails, but it so blatantly
isn't.
Cheers,
Andy
Norman Clarke
> On Thu, May 27, 2010 at 5:32 PM, Yehuda Katz <wyc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> The idea that 16% of Rails users use jQuery is divorced from reality.
>
> But you are talking perceptions, and the sample talks numbers.
>
> Of course 16% has to be taken with some margins, but you can't deny it
> makes difficult to claim that the vast majority of Rails developers
> use jQuery exclusively, which was the claim in (1). That is a strong
> claim! (1 was originally stated as a feeling not a fact, that's fine).
>
> If the percent had been 84% then there would be no doubt about it,
> right? But < 20%... dubious.
This is why I stated that once Rails 3 comes out, it should be easier
to get some "real" numbers on this, since presumably it will be just
as easy for developers to use jQuery as it currently is to use
Prototype, and those users
who actively program in Javascript rather than just using the helpers
will consciously decide to use one or the other.
I would suggest it's a bit late to change the default option at this
time, and if the decision is left for 3.1 it can easily be based at
least in part on real-world numbers that nobody disputes.
Adam Hunter
Xavier Noria
> I completely disagree, just because people don't use jrails, doesn't
> mean they're a prototype user. I generally bring in jQuery manually
> and delete all the prototype cruft from my projects, but I then write
> my own jQuery code to do specifically what I want, ignoring Rails
> helpers.
I know!
The problem is to gauge which percent does that represent. Do you
claim that there's a 50% of people using jQuery exclusively without
jRails to be able to sum up say 70%?
My hypothesis is that that percent is small, and this is of course
speculation. But speculation based on the fact that generally speaking
one prefers to keep the helpers if the cost is as cheap as installing
jRails.
I am not claiming 16% is the exact figure, this is a sample, there's
that other variable. What I say is that the numbers do not seem to
**support**, to bring some evidence in favor of (1), on the contrary.
Daniel Schierbeck
rails devs i know. We do, however, use jQuery.
The JavaScript helpers in Rails 2.3 were rather ugly, from a jQuery point
of view, which probably explains why not that many people felt like using
jRails.
Daniel
Ernie Miller
> Xavier, I for one never use jRails -- in fact, neither do most of the
> rails devs i know. We do, however, use jQuery.
>
> The JavaScript helpers in Rails 2.3 were rather ugly, from a jQuery point
> of view, which probably explains why not that many people felt like using
> jRails.
>
>
> Daniel
Seconded. We use jQuery for almost all of our projects around here, but don't bother with jRails because of the ugly factor.
Ryan Bigg
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Daniel Schierbeck
Prototype users could have a simple command line switch to regain
their old default. Furthermore, I feel that the default JS library is
the least coupled piece of Rails 3 -- changing it is rather
unobtrusive, as long as bindings are available for the major
frameworks.
Cheers,
Daniel
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Norman Clarke
didn't stop. It's a change that affects people creating new Rails
applications - not ones that have already been created.
I'm a big fan of jQuery too but maybe at this point it would be nice
to take an issue off the core team's table. At the end of the day
Rails 3 is still going to work great no matter what the default is.
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Yehuda Katz
Ryan Bigg
Why? SQLite3 was made the default database in 2.0.2 and the world
didn't stop. It's a change that affects people creating new Rails
applications - not ones that have already been created.
I'm a big fan of jQuery too but maybe at this point it would be nice
to take an issue off the core team's table. At the end of the day
Rails 3 is still going to work great no matter what the default is.
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Andrew Kaspick
Rails 3 ships first.
Daniel Schierbeck
Daniel
Xavier Noria
Prototype, though of course it has been the default since the
beginning and that matters.
On the other hand, stats about what people prefer *now* suggest that's
clearly jQuery:
http://survey.hamptoncatlin.com/survey/stats
I think this number is worth taking into account.