I would like to add tabs and modal window widgets all over my website. Both widgets will vary in appearance depending on the page but functionality will be the same.
I found that JQuery UI provides both tabs and modal widgets. I also found various custom JQuery widgets such as modal window by Eric Martin http://www.ericmmartin.com/projects/simplemodal/ and tab menu by Soh Tanaka http://www.sohtanaka.com/web-design/simple-tabs-w-css-jquery/
I need an expert opinion on whether its better to use JQuery UI or custom JQuery Widgets.
I would like to add tabs and modal window widgets all over my website.
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Whichever you prefer. If you’re building a website, you can just go with custom plugins. The advantage is that you can pick anything you like, anything that behaves in the exact way you had in mind.
However, if you’re building a web application or you need loads of different widgets on a page, it’s best to use jQuery UI or some other full widget framework. You can really benefit from the consistency, it will make your life much easier to get those different widgets interact with each other in a logical way, with the least possible coding. All widgets use consistent naming of properties, methods and events, you will spend less time reading the documentation and more time fleshing out your application. You can even use themeroller to make a custom theme to match the rest of your site, none of the widgets will look out-of-place from the rest.