jQuery Handbook

This is the cover of the jQuery Manual, a complete compendium of articles that explain the popular Javascript library in detail and step by step.

jQuery is one of the most essential plugins for web development, used in millions of sites all over the web, as it makes it very easy for us to develop rich client-side applications, in Javascript, compatible with all browsers.

For those who start, it should be clear that jQuery is not a language, but a series of functions and methods of Javascript. Therefore, Javascript is the language and jQuery is a library that we can optionally use if we want to make our lives easier when programming in Javascript. Sometimes we can refer to jQuery as a framework or even as an API of functions, useful in most web projects.

Before jQuery arrived, developers were forced to discriminate between different browsers, to execute that Javascript code that worked in each browser. With the advent of jQuery the main advantage is that we no longer need to worry about whether the user’s browser is Explorer, Chrome, Firefox, etc. Rather, the library itself will do the “dirty” work for us and will execute the code that is compatible with the client’s software that is accessing our website. For this we will use the functions that jQuery provides us, within a wide range of functionalities that also extends through thousands of plugins offered by the community to implement any type of behavior.

To learn jQuery you need to know Javascript. It doesn’t require being a great teacher in the language, but at least you do need to work with it with some ease. Realize that when you program with jQuery you are actually programming with Javascript, so it is important that you do not try to start the house from the roof and first learn the “parent” language. If you do not master Javascript we recommend you start with the .

In this manual we bring you closer to all, or most of, the functionalities that are present in the “core” of jQuery. You will learn things as varied as dynamically modifying page styles, manipulating the DOM, creating fancy effects, working with Ajax, creating your own plugins, and much more. We also have other manuals that explain more specific issues such as jQueryUI.

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