Custom Lightweight JavaScript Libraries: EnderJS and MicroJS

Question

I'm working on a custom lightweight JavaScript library that will need to run stably across the major browsers as well as across numerous independent sites without compromising or being compromised by existing libraries or namespaces. Perhaps most importantly, the library will need to be lightweight (~15k max).

UPDATE To clarify the need for such a small library: This is a third-party service that sites would pull into their page. We need to keep everything as light-weight, speedy, and self-contained as possible since we have no control over the existent libraries, speed, or page load. 15k is the target number just for the library that is accessed by the dynamic content of the service.

At this point my idea is to start with the most condensed jQuery-like base I can find, and then extend with custom modules.

Desired features:

• Handle cross-browser inconsistencies like a champ (IE 6+, Chrome, FF 2+, Safari 3+).
• Event handling (queuing/binding/broadcasting)
• Efficient selector engine
• Chaining
• DOM manipulation w/ basic animations
• Readily build-able and version-able from modules

I've come across EnderJS and MicroJS but I can't seem to find a lot of discussion on either. I'm more familiar and interested in Ender at this point since it seems to address all of the above features almost out of the box with "The Jeesh" weighing in at 7.5k. Tacking on a couple additional packages only pushes it to 10k in my case which would be perfect since I should only need a few k to flesh out any custom modules. It also would allow me to write and version distinct modules that can be incorporated and compressed into the main library at build-time, as well as define a unique namespace to hold it all together and hopefully protect it. Another compelling piece to the Ender library is its use of NodeJS which I would love to play around with more anyway. Having said all of that, however, I am still wide open to other ideas.

So my question is:

Does anyone have any experience with either EnderJS or MicroJS, or have another solution/approach to what I'm trying to accomplish? I realize this is not the place for "chatty, open-ended questions", and that's not my intent here. I'm just looking for suggestions on the best way to approach building a light-weight custom library without reinventing the wheel and to instead plug into the most up to date micro-libraries available.

Answer 1

I'm one of the co-creators of Ender and I'll +1 Fazal's words.

A note on the Jeesh, albeit a nice starter-pack to Ender, the true power lies in the ability to extend Ender with its growing set of modules. You can check them out here: https://github.com/ender-js/Ender/wiki/Ender-package-list

Somehow, one way or another Ender became the forefront of "micro library" development, but really what we're after is putting a cohesive interface onto loosely coupled modules (however large or small they are). jQuery took a great first step in abstracting its selector engine (Sizzle), but unfortunately the rest of it is interdependent (dom, events, animation, ajax, utils, promises), thus making it impossible to pick and pull what you want.

On another aside, one of the neat things about Ender is the ability to publish modules to NPM and being able to port them into your project by name allowing you to build only what you need, when you need it

It's worth checking out the learn videos at http://enderjs.com/learn which will give you a better idea of how packages are authored, built, and consumed. You'll find that setting up Ender into your environment is extremely simple and actually quite fun to work with.

Let us (@ded or @fat) know if you have any questions and we'll be more than willing to help sort things out