I understand that minifying tries to reduce file size by removing whitespace characters. Sometimes things end up on one line, but more often than not, there are multiple lines. I noticed that line breaks happen wherever spaces occur. Wouldn't it be better just to have it all on one line?
A:
Given the lack of sample code and information about how the minification is being performed, my best guess would be: Whatever you are using to view the code is performing word wrapping and there aren't any real new lines in there.
David Dorward
2010-06-25 14:27:55
One error i've had with dreamweaver a few years back was it would truncate lines that were too long (not even wrap) and if you tried to save it your document would get damaged.
Dan Heberden
2010-06-25 14:30:03
+1
A:
Well with JavaScript, a line break can imply the end of a statement (in place of the ;). So putting it all on one line could cause issues with the code functioning correctly.
I would guess that it depends on the minimizer you are using, but that could be one reason. I would think the minimizer would try and account for this and put in semicolons where it can, but this ability could vary wildly between them.
Kevin
2010-06-25 14:28:05