The jQuery UI and jQuery Mobile teams have announced new stable version of their JavaScript libraries including new features, API redesign, improvements and fixes.
After a good number of milestone, beta and RC releases, the jQuery UI team has announced the release of the stable version 1.9.0 coming with new widgets, API redesign and bug fixes. The new widgets are:
- Menu – it has been available in version 1.8 as part of the autocomplete widget; now it is a standalone UI component
- Spinner – besides regular functionality, it can be combined with Globalize to spin currencies and dates.
- Tooltip – works with local and remote content, animation, mouse tracking, etc.
jQuery UI is undergoing a major gradual API redesign as it was decided last year, and 1.9.0 improves on Accordion, Tabs, Position, Widget Factory and Accessibility, while some APIs have been deprecated. The Changelog lists all the changes and the Upgrade Guide is recommended to be consulted before upgrading from an earlier version of the library.
Two more versions are scheduled for the near future, 1.10 and 1.11, bringing more API redesign, accessibility features and tests, and version 2.0 and 2.1 will introduce new widgets – Checkbox, Radio, Multi-select, File Upload, and Grid, among others.
The jQuery Mobile team announced version 1.2.0 last week. The most important addition is represented by the Popup widget which beside the usual dialog with text and buttons can contain menus, forms, scaled images, embedded iframes for video and maps, and overlay panels.
Other new features or improvements in jQuery Mobile 1.2.0 includes: Collapsible Lists, Listview Autodividers, a flat visual style for Read-only Lists, and larger Controlgroup icon buttons.
jQuery Mobile 1.2.0 has dropped support for jQuery 1.6.x but added support for jQuery 1.8, up to 1.8.2. The library has been tested on over 70 devices including iOS 6, Android 4.1, Tizen, and Kindle Fire HD.
