Encode HTML Characters in JavaScript using jQuery

Here's a quick post on how to encode and decode HTML characters in JavaScript using jQuery. I didn't come up with the solution, but I thought it was pretty clever.

function htmlEncode(value){
    return $('<div/>').text(value).html();
}

function htmlDecode(value){
    return $('<div/>').html(value).text();
}

Courtesy of http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1219860/javascript-jquery-html-encoding

jQuery Naming Conventions: Don't Prefix Variables With $

When working with jQuery, I hate it when developers prefix their variables with dollar signs. For example, var $buttons = $('.button');. In my opinion the dollar sign really hurts the readability of the code.

Some developers claim that adding the dollar sign is a good naming convention because it shows that the value represents a jQuery object. If that's the case, then everybody should start using Hungarian notation all of the time. Gross.

The one exception I might make is for var $this = $(this);, although even then I would rather prefer something like var me = $(this);.

Long story short, don't prefix your variables with a dollar sign. Besides, it's not like you're working with PHP or anything.

ColdMVC Updates 1.3.7

Here's a quick post describing some small but relatively cool updates to ColdMVC in version 1.3.7: http://bit.ly/ColdMVC-Updates-1_3_7

ColdMVC Documentation Updates

I recently added some more documentation for ColdMVC:

* An overview of models in ColdMVC: http://www.coldmvc.com/guide/models

* Query operators in ColdMVC: http://www.coldmvc.com/guide/operators

* Building complex queries in ColdMVC: http://www.coldmvc.com/guide/queries

* Getters and setters in ColdMVC: http://www.coldmvc.com/guide/getters-and-setters

* Specify required params for an action: http://www.coldmvc.com/annotations/params

* Specify allowed request methods for an action: http://www.coldmvc.com/annotations/methods

Advanced INI Parsing in ColdFusion

At work, I've been using the Zend Framework for PHP a lot. One of the best features in my opinion is how you're able to manage your configuration settings between different environments within a project.

I've always been a fan of using INI files for storing configuration settings, but the Zend_Config_Ini class that Zend Framework comes with takes INI files to a whole new level by adding section inheritance and nested properties.

After a couple hours, I was able to take the same powerful functionality that Zend Framework provides and port it to ColdFusion, mainly for the purpose of adding it to my ColdMVC framework.

Why do I think this is cool? Let's look at a sample INI file that you might see on a project:


; Settings for the production environment
[production]
autoReload = false
development = false
reminderService.sendReminders = true
facebook.api.username = prod@mycompany.com
facebook.api.password = 90ujlc890$f

; Settings for the staging environment
[staging : production]
reminderService.sendReminders = false
facebook.api.username = staging@mycompany.com
facebook.api.password = 879kjasdf!

; Basic settings for the development environment.
; Each developer should create their own environment that extends this one.
[development : staging]
development = true
autoReload = true

; Settings for Tony's development environment
[development-tony : development]
emailService.options.forceTo = [ "tony@mycompany.com", "tony@gmail.com" ]
facebook.api.username = tony@mycompany.com
facebook.api.password = w1nn1ng

; Settings for Ryan's development environment
[development-ryan : development]
emailService.options.forceTo = ryan@mycompany.com
facebook.api.username = ryan@mycompany.com
facebook.api.password = govikes

; Settings for Joe's development environment
[development-joe : development]
emailService.options.forceTo = joe@mycompany.com
facebook.api.username = joe@mycompany.com
facebook.api.password = welcome


Pretty straightforward settings file. Each environment has its own section, but now it comes with a twist.

See the colons in the section names? That's inheritance in action. If you look at the development-tony environment, you'll see that it extends the development environment, which extends the staging environment, which extends the production environment.

Also, notice the periods in the property names. Those are nested properties, which will be automatically converted to ColdFusion structs at runtime.

So how does this work? Pretty simple:

var ini = new Ini("/path/to/config.ini");
var config = ini.getSection("development-tnelson");

If I were to now dump the config variable that was returned, I'd see the following output:



Pretty sweet if you ask me.

You can find all of the code on GitHub at https://github.com/tonynelson19/ini/, which also includes 26 green unit tests.

Also, I've included the new INI parser in the latest version of ColdMVC, which you should definitely check out if you haven't yet.