Interview: Robert Nyman : Creator of DOMAssistant
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Join For FreeAfter using DOMAssistant on a recent project and enjoying the benefit this library brings to developing JavaScript cross-browser I felt I really needed to speak to the creator of the awesome framework. Next follows an interview I recently had with Robert Nyman about himself, DOMAssistant and the future of the web. Enjoy!
Schalk: Tell us a little bit about yourself, your background and what you are currently doing.
Robert: I
work mainly as an Interface Developer/Architect, doing consultancy
work. Started out with HTML coding in 1998, and while I have dabbled
with both design and some heavier System Development, coding web
interfaces has always been my big interest. At the moment, I work in two projects: development work for an
e-commerce web site and doing auditing and mentoring for Interface
Developers at another company.
Schalk:
What gave you the inspiration to create DOMAssistant?
Robert: Looking at the major JavaScript libraries, I felt that they had
become way too bloated for the needs most people have, and given the
time they've been around, they're full of legacy code and functionality.
Schalk:
How does DOMAssistant help developers?
Robert: DOMAssistant
is one of the most lightweight JavaScript libraries out there, while at
the same time offering the key features everyone needs, such as
selecting elements, handling CSS styling, event handling, DOMReady
functionality, dynamic content creation and AJAX.
Schalk: What other similar solutions are there and why should we choose DOMAssistant?
Robert: Looking
at least at the major JavaScript library players, they all support
about the same subset of features, where CSS selectors are the base
(jQuery, Prototype etc).
With the 2.7 release, DOMAssistant has the fastest and most
accurate CSS selector support in the market, and at the same time the
best Unicode support. And all this comes in merely 7 kb, if you gzip
the compressed version. In the end, though, no JavaScript library is the ultimate solution
for each and every scenario. Evaluate your needs and demands in the
current context you're working in, and choose a JavaScript library from
there.
Schalk:
Although initially created by yourself I see some developers have joined the project. What has led to this decision?
Robert:
Work
load, and getting other perspectives, I'd say. Some of the people in
the team are testing or doing evangelizing, while others contribute
with great code that complements my ideas and visions. It helps me to avoid coding errors or missing some specific
scenario, hence leading to better and more efficient and stable
releases.
Schalk:
With the recent release of version 2.7 of
DOMAssistant please give us some insider info with regards to your
focus for the next release.
Robert: Currently, we're just doing minor tweaking to existing functions,
to make the code even smaller and maintainable. Our next step is rather
working more on useful plugins and spreading the word, than adding
features to the core code.
Schalk:
How can the community and users out there get involved with the evolution of DOMAssistant?
Robert: They can participate in the discussion group (http://groups.google.com/group/domassistant) and help us in developing plugins (http://www.domassistant.com/plugins/)
or porting plugins to other JavaScript libraries to DOMAssistant. But,
most of all, they can try it out and give us feedback about what they
think.
Schalk:
JavaScript has grown from the dark horse of the web to one of the
corner stones current web sites. Frameworks such as DOMAssistant has
gone a long way in creating this change. What do you expect or hope
from the future and, how do you think the face of web development i
going to change over the next 5 years?
Robert: It's lovely, isn't it? :-) At least if you're a JavaScript developer, that is!
It's
very hard to say about the future, but I think there will be a lot of
competition the upcoming years between Silverlight and Flex/Adobe AIR.
HTML 5 will probably make it's way into the market during that
time, and I sincerely hope Microsoft releases a kick-ass web browser
with IE 8 (although seeing basically no new JavaScript support added,
proper event handling etc I'm not really having high hopes).
Schalk:
Anything you want to leave us with?
Robert: Make sure you
cooperate with the other skill sets around you. Develop code which is
both accessible and cross browser/cross platform, since we have had
enough of lock-ins throughout the years. And, naturally, I wish for you to try out DOMAssistant if you haven't already. :-)
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