Is there a plugin which will automatically minify and cache JavaScript?

Question

I'm getting ready to start on a new project and I'd like to know if there's a way to automatically minify JavaScript on the server side, providing caching once the JavaScript has been minified once already? I could simply write a build script to accomplish this, but it'd be nice if I could "fire-and-forget" so to speak, with automatic minification. What would be the recommended route in this scenario? Should I minify my JavaScript before it goes online at the cost of time or should I look for something that'll automatically do it for me on the serverside?

EDIT

I'll probably be using Django, but of course, JavaScript and media is served separately from the actual "HTML"/application output.

Answer 1

This will all depend on what server side language you're using. It will have nothing (so much) to do with Javascript or Css, but rather PHP, .NET, Ruby, etc.

(note: these are just some quick searches I've done. I don't have any experience with any of them.)

• PHP: How to minify JS or CSS on the fly
• .NET: Minifying and combining files in .net
• Ruby: Juicer - a CSS and JavaScript packaging tool

I personally recommend NOT doing ANY of the minification / combining at run time since there is a server side performance hit that happens over and over and over again.

Above is my "Answer"

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Below is my "Preference"

My preference is to use some sort of a Build Time minification / combining tool that achieves the goal once and leaves the server to just "serve".

Since I'm running Visual Studio for my IDE, my preference is to use a tool called Chirpy... the end result is a single static site.min.js file and a single static site.min.css file that has everything I need. I will no longer suffer a performance hit from combining/minifying my js/css at run time.

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Edit

Be sure to read the comments below, as they help add to the overall concept of what the OP is looking for.

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Edit

Also just found WebPutty, looks like a pretty slick tool.

Answer 2

YUI Compressor works amazingly for me, requires Java on the server and you passing it the right params:

Here is my build script I use (written in Ruby, but does not have to), it calls the compressor with the right params, thats all it does.

#
# Build JS Files
#
require 'rake/packagetask'

JAVA = 'java'
OUTPUT = 'public/js/sitel-core.js'
MINOUTPUT = 'public/js/sitel-core.min.js'
OUTCSS = 'public/css/styles.css'
MINCSS = 'public/css/styles.min.css'
WIZOUT = 'public/js/sitel-wizard.js'
WIZMIN = 'public/js/sitel-wizard.min.js'

desc "Build CSS Scripts"
task :buildcss do
    files = 'public/css/styles.css'
    `#{JAVA} -jar build/yuicompressor.jar #{OUTCSS} -o #{MINCSS}`
end

desc "Build JS Scripts"
task :build => [:buildcss] do
    files = 'public/js/sitel.js public/js/sitel/popup.js public/js/microtable.js public/js/microbox.js public/js/sitel/popup.page.js public/js/sitel/flexigrid.js public/js/flexigrid/flexigrid.js public/js/nyroModal-1.6.2/js/jquery.nyroModal-1.6.2.js public/js/help-bubble.js public/js/sitel/elgg.js'
    `cat #{files} > #{OUTPUT}`
    `#{JAVA} -jar build/yuicompressor.jar #{OUTPUT} -o #{MINOUTPUT}`    

    wizard = 'public/js/wizard2.js public/js/dual-select.js public/js/filterbox.js public/js/jquery-validate/jquery.validate.js public/js/smartsearch.js public/js/smartsearch-validator.js public/js/flexigrid/flexigrid_helper.js '
    `cat #{wizard} > #{WIZOUT}`
    `#{JAVA} -jar build/yuicompressor.jar #{WIZOUT} -o #{WIZMIN}`
end

desc "Build JS Scripts"
task :default => :build