Troubles Writing A Proper Jquery Plugin

I'm in the process of rewriting a jQuery plugin to be used in an RSS reader I'm building during an internship. This plugin uses Google's Feed API to pull a JSON-formatted RSS feed

Solution 1:

You add to $.fn if you want your function to be available on jQuery instances (e.g., the objects you get back from $("your selector here") and such). If you want your function available from the $ object directly, you add it directly to it.

Here's an example showing each:

// Creating the plugin
(function($) {
  
  // This will be on *instances*
  $.fn.green = function() {
    // `this` is the jQuery instance we were called onreturnthis.css("color", "green");
  };
  
  // This will be on the $/jQuery object itself
  $.blue = function(selector) {
    // You don't use `this` here (you could if you want,// it will be === $/jQuery, but there's no reason to)
    $(selector).css("color", "blue");
    returnthis;
  };
  
})(jQuery);

// UsagejQuery(function($) {
  
  // Make all divs green with a border
  $("div").green().css("border", "1px solid green");
  
  // Make all paragraphs blue
  $.blue("p");
  
});

<div>I'm a div</div><p>I'm a paragraph</p><scriptsrc="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script>

Solution 2:

See where I've done exactly what the author was wanting to do here! I simply used this template I've been using for years:

(function($) {
    if (!$.myExample) { // check your plugin namespace does not already exist
        $.extend({  //  this will allow you to add your plugin to the jQuery libmyExample: function(elm, command, args) {
                //  keep in mind, right here you might want to do a class or data check to determine which direction this call is going//  for example, upon init the plugin on an element you may add the plugin name as a class, //      this way, when it's recalled, you can see it alrady has that class and might be calling a command,//          thus make an if statemnt to push the process throughreturn elm.each(function(index){
                    // do work to each element as its passed through// be sure to use something like//    return elm.each(function(e) { dor work });// as your final statement in order to maintain "chainability"
                });
            }
        });
        $.fn.extend({   //  this gives the chainability functionality seen with $ funcs like: $("#eleID").css("color", "red") <--returns original element objectmyExample: function(command) {
                return $.myExample($(this), command, Array.prototype.slice.call(arguments, 1));
            }
        });
        $.myExample.props = {   //  Here you can establish specific properties to your plugin, prehaps even make them "Over-writable"key1: "value",
            key2: "value"
        };
        $.myExample.methods = { //  Here you can establish specific methods/functions for your plguin to carry out and maintain your namespace as wellkey1: function(param) {
                /*  do work */
            },
            key2: function(param) {
                /*  do work */
            }
        };
        //  This next part is not seen in many plugins but useful depending on what you're creating
        $.myExample.init = function(param) {    //  If you have an initialize method to apply, namespace it in here and calll on initializing your pluginvar key = "value",
                key2 = {
                    subKey: "value"
                };
                /*
                /  run any number of initializing functions here
                /  I prefer to make my param a value that can be a
                /   string with a possible object
                /   the string for holding a base configuration
                /   the object for any change in properties or base values for that config
                */
        };
        $.myExample.defaults = {    //  establish base properties here that can be over-written via .props, but their values should never truly changekey1: "value",
            key2: {
                prop1: {
                    subKey1: "value",
                    subKey2: "value"
                },
                prop2: {
                    subKey1: "value"
                }
            },
            key3: function(param) {

            }
        };
    }
})(jQuery);