Question

Hi I am building a plugin which unfortunately has 146 options…

What is the best way to merge (cut down) options.

Sorry for my poor english.

Example:

Lets say we want to apply different color to two different elements.

Normal Default Options:

elemColor1:'black',
elemColor2:'red',

and use them like this:

elem1.css('color',options.elemColor1);
elem1.css('color',options.elemColor2);

or as array?

elemColor:['black','red'],

and use them like this:

elem1.css('color',options.elemColor[0]);
elem2.css('color',options.elemColor[1]);

or as object?

elemColor:{color1:'black',color2:'red'},

and use them like this:

elem1.css('color',options.elemColor.color1);
elem2.css('color',options.elemColor.color2);

if passed as Array or Object we have the problem that if we set other parameters than default and we forget the second argument of elemColor.

elemColor:['green'],

then jquery plugin cannot read default second value (red).

Which is better(performance, smaller file size, e.t.c)?

Is there any other way???

Answer 1

There is no doubt that objects are easier to manage and won’t cost you any significant performance in the long run. If you really have a lot consecutive options (color1, color2, color3, etc.), it may make sense to use an array as an object value. Just be sure to organize and comment well. Something like:

{colors: [
          '#fff', // element 1
          '#000', // 2
          '#ccc', // 3
          ...
         ]
}