Ajax Girl

Fork is the latest JavaScript library to be put out there.

Fork is a general purpose, namespaced JavaScript library with Ajax, Events, DOM manipulation. There are a few bonus lines of code specifically for use with Ruby on Rails but Fork can be happily used outside of Rails also.

Why create yet another JavaScript library?

There are many JavaScript libraries out there. Why add another one to the list? To create a quality library with a liberal license.

I like Ruby on Rails. The Rails default Prototype JavaScript library does not suit many development situations and contains code that makes developing for a wide selection of browsers difficult or impossible. Prototype has some great ideas in it’s mix but the implementation quality has been questioned many times. Prototype has influenced many JavaScript libraries and some of Prototype’s best ideas have also influenced the Fork API. Because Fork is a namespaced library, you may be able to use both Fork and Prototype simultaneously as you transition from one to the other.

I like the Yahoo! UI library. Of the JavaScript libraries I’ve used it has the best API. The YUI library has many valuable nuggets of information about browser bugs and workarounds. The approach of YUI suits browser scripting well. However there are more than a few places in the code where I’m left scratching my head and thinking “why did they do that?” Probably that is how every developer looks at another developers code. The YUI API is the starting point for much of the Fork API.

Most libraries seem to develop too quickly. I like the general debian attitude of careful growth because the browser execution environment is wildly varied and deserves a certain degree of conservatism in the JavaScript we send to it.

I am looking forward to unfork.

Source: Ajaxian
Original Article: http://ajaxian.com/archives/fork-one-more-javascript-library