jQuery on iPhone/Android/BlackBerry

Question

I don't have any of the devices to test at the moment. I guess I'll start using the emulators later on.

We're looking to offer mobile support. I was wondering how jQuery or even javascript renders in their respective browsers.

What works? What doesn't? Any tips? Advice?

Answer 1

I've used jQuery on iPhone. Remember that Mobile Safari is not an officially supported browser for jQuery. But it's close enough to Safari that most things work.

If I recall correctly, mousedown event doesn't happen until the mouseup happens, at which point both fire. My guess is that most things will work, but you need to test everything carefully.

My experience is that changing the DOM is unexpectedly slow. Things that fly on the emulator can drag on the device. (You mentioned you'd be using emulators--do NOT trust performance you get on them.)

jQuery might be overkill. I ended up relying on XUI, which gives you a lot of the jQuery stuff, but is much more lightweight, and also gives you touch events. http://github.com/brianleroux/xui/tree/master

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ppk has begun testing mobile browsers. http://www.quirksmode.org/m/w3c_core.html

Answer 2

Came across this today and remember reading your post on here. Thought I would include the link for anyone that's interested in this jQuery project for the iPhone:

http://jqtouch.com/

Haven't had a chance to try it out yet, but it seems to replicate a lot of the iPhone interface elements within the browser. I think it shows some promise, and uses a lot of the jQuery conventions.

Answer 3

Do not expect jquery to work much at all on Blackberry. The default browser is very limited in terms of JavaScript and page rendering.

Though opera on Blackberry might be a different story...

Answer 4

I use JQTouch on i-phone a lot and think its great. It does not work on Android. JQuery is very, very slow (Android 2.0 HTC Desire and Legend) and as such JQTouch suffers. Also, animations are very poor, worse than WebKit nightly on my Mac, which are fairly flickery... You get the idea but nothing as smooth as the i-phone. I really like the Android platform and JQTouch, but they don't sit well together.

G*

Answer 5

You can use this new lib: http://www.sencha.com/