JQuery Mobile Framework Announced • Hacker News Board

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#21

Post by dcurtis » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:09 PM UTC

jeresig wrote: post #11

raganwald wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I laud your transparency, I lament the chilling effect this will have on existing libraries like JQTouch. jQuery Mobile isn't available today but this announcement will make a lot of people sit on their hands waiting to see how things play out in the hope that they won't invest in a dead-end platform. Oh well, not saying you shouldn't have chosen this path, just pointing out the consequences...

jQTouch has been out for a couple years at this point - a two month "chill" period before release seems totally appropriate. Honestly, I don't see the "chill" as being a bad thing in this regard: jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms. If we can get developers to actually think about supporting more of the mobile platfor…

"jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms."

How is focusing on the future doing a disservice to anyone? We're at the very beginning of the mobile-optimized web, and the future is still unclear. There's still room to define it. Supporting the equivalent of IE6 on mobile devices seems like a waste of time to me, especially after we've just spent a decade watching the evolution of the desktop web be stunted by obsessive focus on backwards/cross compatibility.

Also, nearly all major device manufacturers have committed to using WebKit. In five years, how many mobile devices will not run WebKit? If Windows Phone 7 isn't dead by then, it might be the only one.

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#22

Post by Toddparker » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:14 PM UTC

jsdalton wrote: post #16

The initial designs look outstanding: http://jquerymobile.com/designs/

Thanks for the positive feedback. You nailed what we were going for. Glad people seem to like the direction of the project!

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#23

Post by stevenwei » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:18 PM UTC

This is great news. I had to hack apart jQTouch to get it to degrade more gracefully on non-Webkit browsers, and development seems to have stopped as the devs have moved onto Sencha Touch.

Nice to see that the jQuery team is taking the project on, and I'll be very excited to use it once it is released.

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#24

Post by bhellman1 » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:26 PM UTC

Thank heavens! The learning curve and lack of tutorials for Sencha Touch made JQuery mobile a desperate need. I believe JQuery mobile will be the winner of the various mobile app platforms 1 year from now.

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#25

Post by armandososa » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:37 PM UTC

jeresig wrote: post #11

raganwald wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I laud your transparency, I lament the chilling effect this will have on existing libraries like JQTouch. jQuery Mobile isn't available today but this announcement will make a lot of people sit on their hands waiting to see how things play out in the hope that they won't invest in a dead-end platform. Oh well, not saying you shouldn't have chosen this path, just pointing out the consequences...

jQTouch has been out for a couple years at this point - a two month "chill" period before release seems totally appropriate. Honestly, I don't see the "chill" as being a bad thing in this regard: jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms. If we can get developers to actually think about supporting more of the mobile platfor…

With all due respecy John, I think we all should focus only on the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms or on platforms that are comparably good. Mobile development is exciting precisely because it's a road to the future.

Look at the place we are in desktop web development because we have to support old browser. We are stuck 7+ years in the past.

I understand the intellectual allure of writing a framework that supports a gazillion different devices and I appreciate what you've done with jQuery for web development but frankly, I don't care about jQueryMobile.

Except that it scares the hell out of me the day some client starts asking me to support 5 year old Nokias.

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#26

Post by _neil » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:39 PM UTC

dcurtis wrote: post #21

jeresig wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

jQTouch has been out for a couple years at this point - a two month "chill" period before release seems totally appropriate. Honestly, I don't see the "chill" as being a bad thing in this regard: jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms. If we can get developers to actually think about supporting more of the mobile platfor…

"jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms." How is focusing on the future doing a disservice to anyone? We're at the very beginning of the mobile-optimized web, and the future is still unclear. There's still room to define it. Supporting the equivalent of IE6 on mobile devices seems like a waste of time to me, especially a…

Competition is a good thing. Choice is cool.

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#27

Post by mrkurt » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 10:39 PM UTC

dcurtis wrote: post #21

jeresig wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

jQTouch has been out for a couple years at this point - a two month "chill" period before release seems totally appropriate. Honestly, I don't see the "chill" as being a bad thing in this regard: jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms. If we can get developers to actually think about supporting more of the mobile platfor…

"jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms." How is focusing on the future doing a disservice to anyone? We're at the very beginning of the mobile-optimized web, and the future is still unclear. There's still room to define it. Supporting the equivalent of IE6 on mobile devices seems like a waste of time to me, especially a…

I don't really relish a future where one browser engine dominates the way IE has in the past. I fully expect and hope for more viable mobile engines.

Even still, jQtouch (at least, I haven't messed with the Sencha thing) is very iDevice slanted. There's "webkit" and then there's "webkit on iOS", and most tools are targeted specifically at "webkit on iOS".

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#28

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 11:02 PM UTC

mortenjorck wrote: post #18

jsdalton wrote: post #16

The initial designs look outstanding: http://jquerymobile.com/designs/

A bit of iOS's proportions, a bit of WebOS's textures, a bit of Android's color – yet they've managed to keep it looking clean and unified instead of middling or compromised. Outstanding indeed.

[deleted]

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#29

Post by evilhackerdude » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 11:11 PM UTC

jeresig wrote: post #12

jmtame wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the mobile ui elements the jquery team is building is the best i've seen so far. they've done a spectacular job there. i hope that as with jquery themeroller, the ui elements for mobile will be customizable.

Yep - they're going to be 100% Themeroller-able. It's going to be a bunch of work on our end but the ability to have a unified, good-looking, UI that works across all platforms is just too enticing to ignore.

Did you consider pre-rendering stuff client-side using SVG? I assume adjusting a few parameters in a JSON file is easier than going to a site, pushing buttons and downloading and replacing files.

Re: JQuery Mobile Framework Announced

#30

Post by mixmax » Fri, Aug 13, 2010, 11:15 PM UTC

armandososa wrote: post #25

jeresig wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

jQTouch has been out for a couple years at this point - a two month "chill" period before release seems totally appropriate. Honestly, I don't see the "chill" as being a bad thing in this regard: jQTouch and Sencha Touch are doing mobile web development a great disservice by only supporting the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms. If we can get developers to actually think about supporting more of the mobile platfor…

With all due respecy John, I think we all should focus only on the latest-and-greatest WebKit platforms or on platforms that are comparably good. Mobile development is exciting precisely because it's a road to the future. Look at the place we are in desktop web development because we have to support old browser. We are stuck 7+ years in the past. I understand the intellectual allure of writing a framework that suppor…

Jquery mobile is great because they will try to support as many platforms as possible. If you run a real mobile site with a lot of users you have to take small platforms into consideration, just like your website needs to support IE 6 if you have lots of users. It's not fun but it would be bad business not to do it.[1]

If a mobile framework can reach this goal it will make mobile development a heck of a lot easier, and I applaud that.

[1] You need some scale before development for platforms that maybe constitute 3% of your users will be a financially good option.