Public functions from within a jQuery plugin

Question

I love the jQuery plugin architecture, however, I find it frustrating (probably due to a lack of understanding on my part) when I want to retain a reference to the plugin instance to access properties or methods later on in my code.

Edit: I want to clarify that what I am really trying to do is retain a reference to the methods and properties used within the plugin, so that I can use them later

Lets take the case of a AJAX loading icon. In a more traditional OOP environment, I could do:

var myIcon = new AJAXIcon();
myIcon.start();
//some stuff
myIcon.stop();

The methods and properties of my object are stored on a variable for later use. Now if I want to have the same functionality in a jQuery plugin, I would call it from my main code somewhat like this:

$("#myId").ajaxIcon()

By convention, my plugin needs to return the original jQuery object passed to my plugin allowing for chainability, but if I do that, I loose the ability to access methods and properties of the plugin instance.

Now, I know that you can declare a public function in my plugin, somewhat along the lines of

$.fn.ajaxIcon = function(options) {
    return this.each(function () {
        //do some stuff
    }
}

$.fn.ajaxIcon.stop = function() {
    //stop stuff
}

However, without breaking the convention of returning the original jQuery object, I can't retain a reference to the specific instance of the plugin that I want to refer to.

I would like to be able to do something like this:

var myIcon = $("myId").ajaxIcon(); //myIcon = a reference to the ajaxIcon 
myIcon.start();
//some stuff
myIcon.stop();

Any thoughts?

Answer 1

Most of the jQuery plugins that I see trying to accomplish this will use an anonymous scope and closures to reference functions and variables unique to that instance. For example, using the following pattern:

;(function ($) {
    // your code
})(jQuery);

Between the beginning and end of the module, you can declare any functions you want. You won't pollute the global namespace and you can retain access to local variables through closures, that could solve a lot of your problems. Also, don't be afraid to use the $.data functions.

Answer 2

I think you could accomplish what you're looking for with something like this:

var myIcon = $("myId").ajaxIcon(); //myIcon = a reference to the ajaxIcon 
$.ajaxIcon.start(myIcon);//some stuff
$.ajaxIcon.stop(myIcon);

Haven't tested it though - I don't have access to an environment where I can do that atm

Answer 3

Ok, i figured out how to do this:

Plugin Code:

$.ajaxIcon.init = function(element, options) {
    //your initialization code

    this.start = function() {
         //start code
    }

    this.stop = function() {
         //stop code
    }
}

$.fn.ajaxIcon = function(options) {
    this.each(function () {
        //This is where the magic happens
        jQuery(this).data('ajaxIcon', new jQuery.ajaxIcon.init(this, opts));
    });

return this;
}

Then to use it somewhere else in your code:

var myIcon = $("#myId").ajaxIcon.data('ajaxIcon') 
// myIcon: a reference to the 'init' object specific to this plugin instance
myIcon.start();
myIcon.stop();

voila, answered my own question :)

Answer 4

If you do something like the following:

(function($){

$.fn.myPlugin = function(options) {
    // support mutltiple elements
    if (this.length > 1){
     this.each(function() { $(this).myPlugin(options) });
     return this;
    }

    // private variables
    var pOne = '';
    var pTwo = '';
    // ...

    // private methods
    var foo = function() {
     // do something ...
    }
    // ...

    // public methods        
    this.intialize = function() {
     // do something ...
     return this;
    };

    this.bar = function() {
     // do something ...
    };
    return this.intiazlie();
}

});

Then you can access any of your public methods:

var myPlugin = $('#id').myPlugin();

myPlugin.bar();

This is taken from this very helpful article (May 2009) from trulyevil.com which is itself an extension on this article (Oct 2007) from learningjquery.com.