Question

I’m trying to throw together a single js file that includes the functionality of jquery’s .load(), as well as the methods, in an effort to link only to a single js file, rather than both jquery and the load methods.

Instead of

<script src="jquery.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script src="load.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

this

<script src="load_including-necessary-js-for-load-methods.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

So basically I’m trying to extract only the necessary code from within jquery that makes .load() work and include it in the file with the load methods.

Answer 1

Suggest, instead, that you use something along the lines of html5boilerplate’s jQuery call:

<script src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.8.2/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script>window.jQuery || document.write('<script src="js/vendor/jquery-1.8.2.min.js"><\/script>')</script>

1. Accessing it via the CDN ensures high-speed delivery of the jQuery code that is used by thousands of other pages/users on a constant basis,
2. … which also means that that code is most likely cached in your users’ browsers …
3. … which equates to highly-tested code that you’re really not “paying for” in terms of overall load time. The second line, of course, allows you to offer a copy of it from your own site, in case the CDN has a hiccup, or you need to be testing offline (in which case, AJAX is borked for you any way you look at it, anyhow…).

OTHERWISE, check out the instructions on jQuery’s Github: https://github.com/jquery/jquery#how-to-build-your-own-jquery and read up on building your own… they have instructions, there for excluding modules that you don’t want from the library.

After that, you’ll probably want to use some kind of bundling script to bundle all your JS (your custom jQuery build + your scripts) together, if you want to reduce everything to one call.