Currently Reading: Top 10 Javascript Frameworks - Which do you prefer?

Top 10 Javascript Frameworks - Which do you prefer?
April 1, 2008 - Categories: Ajax, Javascript, Web 2.0 Apps.
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Javascript libraries have become fundamental to good web design, almost all ste nowadays have some element of javascript or Ajax present. It is probably the main element in developing the Web 2.0 movement.
There are many Frameworks, which do you prefer?

1. script.aculo.us (http://script.aculo.us/)

script.aculo.usURL: http://script.aculo.us/.
Blog: n/a.
Documentation: http://wiki.script.aculo.us/.
Note: script.aculo.us is not a Framework by its self but it is an addon for Prototype.

“script.aculo.us provides you with easy-to-use, cross-browser user interface JavaScript libraries to make your web sites and web applications fly.”

2. Prototype (http://www.prototypejs.org/)

PrototypeURL: http://www.prototypejs.org/.
Blog: http://www.prototypejs.org/blog.
Documentation: http://www.prototypejs.org/learn.

“Prototype is a JavaScript Framework that aims to ease development of dynamic web applications. Featuring a unique, easy-to-use toolkit for class-driven development and the nicest Ajax library around, Prototype is quickly becoming the codebase of choice for web application developers everywhere.”

3. Moo Tools (http://www.mootools.net/)

Moo ToolsURL: http://www.mootools.net/.
Blog: http://blog.mootools.net/.
Documentation: http://docs.mootools.net/.
Demos:http://demos.mootools.net/.

“MooTools is a compact, modular, Object-Oriented JavaScript framework designed for the intermediate to advanced JavaScript developer. It allows you to write powerful, flexible, and cross-browser code with its elegant, well documented, and coherent API.”

4. jQuery (http://jquery.com/)

jQueryURL: http://jquery.com/.
Blog: http://jquery.com/blog/.
Documentation: http://docs.jquery.com/.

“jQuery is a fast, concise, JavaScript Library that simplifies how you traverse HTML documents, handle events, perform animations, and add Ajax interactions to your web pages. jQuery is designed to change the way that you write JavaScript”.

5. MochiKit (http://www.mochikit.com/)

MochiKitURL: http://www.mochikit.com/.
Blog: http://www.mochikit.com/blog.html.
Documentation: http://www.mochikit.com/doc/html/MochiKit/index.html.
Demos:http://www.mochikit.com/demos.html.

“MochiKit - makes JavaScript suck a bit less”.

6. Rialto (http://rialto.improve-technologies.com/wiki/)

URL: http://rialto.improve-technologies.com/wiki/.
Blog: n/a
Documentation: http://rialto.improve-technologies.com/js/doc/.
Demos:http://rialto.improve-technologies.com/rialto/.

“Rialto (Rich Internet Application Toolkit) is ajax-based cross browser javascript widgets library”.

7. Dojo Toolkit (http://dojotoolkit.org)

URL: http://dojotoolkit.org/about.
Blog: http://dojotoolkit.org/blog.
Documentation: http://dojotoolkit.org/docs.
Demos:http://dojotoolkit.org/demos.

“Dojo is an Open Source DHTML toolkit written in JavaScript. Dojo aims to solve some long-standing historical problems with DHTML which prevented mass adoption of dynamic web application development”.

8. Spry Framework (http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/spry/)

URL: http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/spry/.
Blog: n/a.
Documentation: http://www.adobe.com/go/labs_gnav_wiki.
Demos:http://www.adobe.com/go/labs_gnav_showcase.

“The Spry framework for Ajax is a JavaScript library that provides easy-to-use yet powerful Ajax functionality that allows designers to build pages that provide a richer experience for their users. It is designed to take the complexity out of Ajax and allow designers to easily create Web 2.0 pages”.

9. ASP.NET Ajax Framework (http://asp.net/ajax/)

URL: http://asp.net/ajax/.
Blog: n/a.
Documentation: http://asp.net/ajax/documentation/.
Demos:http://asp.net/ajax/showcase/.

“ASP.NET AJAX is a free framework for quickly creating efficient and interactive Web applications that work across all popular browsers”.

10. Cean Ajax Framework (http://sourceforge.net/projects/clean-ajax/)

URL: http://sourceforge.net/projects/clean-ajax/.
Blog: n/a.
Documentation: http://sourceforge.net/docman/?group_id=145307.

“Easy to use AJAX framework that provides message queue, XSLT, XPath, encryption (SHA1, MD5), web service access (SOAP, XMLRPC), JSON-RPC, cross browser AJAX, AJAX history and cache control”.

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36 Comments so far

  1. Jowra on April 1, 2008 6:59 am

    MooTools.

    jQuery is great too, but I like the style and elegance of MooTools.

  2. Chris on April 1, 2008 7:11 am

    After much time spent on many of these I came away a jQuery convert.

  3. Jim Knight on April 1, 2008 8:50 am

    Jquery can’t be beat. Easy to use if you know CSS. Simple ajax. Chaining is great.

  4. João Araújo on April 1, 2008 9:22 am

    Have used Prototype but since I discovered Jquery I never looked back!

  5. Brian Moschel on April 1, 2008 11:21 am

    JavaScriptMVC is another to add to the list. It stresses best practices like file and code organization, compression, error notification, and testing.

  6. milus on April 1, 2008 11:54 am

    Definitely jQuery!

  7. noth on April 1, 2008 12:59 pm

    jquery!!!

  8. jeff haynie on April 1, 2008 3:24 pm

    You should also check out the Appcelerator RIA platform at http://www.appcelerator.org

  9. michael on April 1, 2008 5:50 pm

    The last one Should be “clean ajax” and not “cean ajax”

  10. Zac on April 1, 2008 7:08 pm

    Another for jquery!

  11. flashpro on April 1, 2008 11:30 pm

    Why is Yahoo! YUI not in the list?

  12. JamieO on April 2, 2008 10:47 am

    I, like most on this list, think that jQuery is the sh*t. But regardless of your preference - before you start AJAX’ing this and animating that, you should detect if the visitor is one of those poor unfortunate souls who has turned javascript off, does not have it installed or using archaic technology.

  13. mrrookie on April 2, 2008 6:19 pm

    I am pretty new to the whole javascript thing and after doing a bit of research, i started learning jquery and i feel very very comfortable with it.

  14. Iain on April 3, 2008 1:57 am

    I started out with prototype, but a colleague put me onto jQuery and I never looked back.

  15. mel on April 3, 2008 11:25 am

    I’m personally all over the place…

    scriptaculous and mootools are crazy easy to implement

    I’ve just started working with the Yahoo YUI stuff and it’s a little tricky to get going at first but I like the extensive library and examples so you aaren’t left searching newsgroups for more complicated code…

    Even though I haven’t used it yet, I’ve a TUN more published about JQuery in recent monhts so I think that will actually be my next choice :)

  16. José Chafardet on April 4, 2008 8:22 pm

    jQuery all the way, i find mootools very good, and have used scriptaculous a bit, but since i discovered jQuery, i fell inlove with it.

  17. Publicidad en Internet on April 8, 2008 3:48 pm

    I was using mootols, but i think jquery have bigger possibilities and community to support the applications

  18. Philip Weaver on June 17, 2008 4:52 pm

    Echo3 now supports creating webapps in Javascript. It supports object literal notation, layouts with zero HTML, a component model, and is extensively stylable/customizable using component oriented stylesheets. It is very elegant, lean, and easy to use.
    http://echo.nextapp.com/site/echo3
    (Apologies if this is reposted - entered email was incorrectly.)

  19. Asfahaan on July 1, 2008 7:18 pm

    Thanks! :)

  20. dark_cybernetics on September 5, 2008 8:48 am

    how about extJS.com ?

  21. David Smith on September 27, 2008 3:29 pm

    You should check out the light weight JAK Framework. JAK is an Open Source Object Oriented Program built enterprises.

  22. Steve on October 2, 2008 8:03 am

    Most people know this already, but Scriptaculous requires Prototype; it is like Prototype’s GUI effects stuff. So is Rico, not listed here.
    But yeah, jQuery rocks the house!

  23. Andi Gutmans on October 21, 2008 5:06 am

    CodeIgniter rocks!

  24. Mike V. on November 10, 2008 10:46 am

    Excluding Ext JS from this list is pure incompetence. Five of the ten listed should not even be on the list. Do some research next time.