Thank you Mr Crowder, that was quite informative.
Still I'm a little unsure how to proceed. If I got this right, it is
common sense now that extending the DOM is the wrong thing to do. One
of the main reasons is the possibility of name-conflicts. So I thought
I might extend Objects with a JSON-Object (called 'builder' in my
case) which contains all my methods and properties to (sort of) have
my own namespace. But that would require a circular reference in my
builder-object to the DOM-Element it is attached to (so the methods in
my builder-object can work on the DOM they are attached to).
I'm wondering if there's any way to keep that nice programming-
paradigm prototype introduced with it's $-function, that you can
simply write $('myelement').myfunction() while avoiding the above-
mentioned problems. I could write my own wrapper-method, like jQuery's
$-function, but that would miss the whole point of working with
prototype.
How do other people work with this?
Luke
On Nov 22, 7:37 am, "T.J. Crowder" <t...@crowdersoftware.com> wrote:
> Hi Luke,
>
> What you're talking about doing is called an "expando" property.
> They're not covered by a standard AFAIK, although interestingly
> Microsoft has an `expando` property on objects[1] (this is where the
> name came from) which is a boolean saying whether you can do this. If
> you do a web search on "expando" you'll find a lot more information
> (and a studio album by Timothy B. Schmit, but leave that aside...).
> (Ignore the statement on GreaseSpot that expandos relate to custom
> attributes; they don't, the article is just wrong.)
>
> Prototype uses expando properties like mad (the whole concept of
> "extending" an element[2] relies on expandos, and Prototype uses them
> elsewhere as well), so if you're using Prototype, you're already
> relying on the environment allowing expandos. But it's probably worth
> noting that Prototype is moving away from expandos at some point in
> favor of doing a jQuery-like wrapper thing instead.
>
> I'd avoid having your expando property value (directly or indirectly)
> reference another DOM element, as that sets up the possibility of
> circular references, and circular references that dip between the DOM
> and JavaScript layers can cause memory leaks on IE.
>
> [1]http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms533747(VS.85).aspx
> [2]http://prototypejs.org/learn/extensions
>
> Happy coding,
> --
> T.J. Crowder
> Independent Software Engineer
> tj / crowder software / com
> www / crowder software / com
>
> On Nov 21, 8:28 pm, Luke <kickingje...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > Thanks Walter. If that's the only reason I'm willing to take that
> > risk. In my whole application I will only attach one variable, kind of
> > like my namespace and this will give me some convenience when
> > accessing that namespace. If it's conform to W3C standards and works
> > in all browsers, I think it's ok. But is it? Can't find any
> > documentation or specification on this
>
> > Luke
>
> > On Nov 21, 8:50 pm, Walter Lee Davis <wa...@wdstudio.com> wrote:
>
> > > I think that the basic reason for the separate store is to provide
> > > insulation from any current, past, or future browsers tramping on a
> > > key name you may choose today and test in some subset of all browsers.
> > > Browser scripting is fun enough in IE with its amusing conflation of
> > > Name and ID properties without getting into the weeds with a perfectly-
> > > safe-seeming data element being confused for some completely other
> > > property or method.
>
> > > Walter
>
> > > On Nov 21, 2010, at 2:15 PM, Luke wrote:
>
> > > > Hi,
>
> > > > is there anyting wrong with extending a DOM-Object with
>
> > > > $('myelement').myvariable = "something";
>
> > > > or why is there the prototype-method store, which saves values in a
> > > > seperate hash?
>
> > > > Thank you,
> > > > Lukas
>
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