Hot off the presses: jQuery 1.4 Alpha 1 is released! This is the first alpha release of jQuery 1.4. The code is stable (passing all tests in all browsers we support), feature-complete (we’re no longer accepting new features for the release), and needs to be tested in live applications.

Grab the code:

• Regular: http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.4a1.js
• Minified: http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.4a1.min.js

NOTE: If you’re using jQuery 1.4a1 and you run into an error please make sure that you’re using the regular version of the code, it’ll make it easier to spot where the error is occurring.

How can I help?

To start, try dropping the above un-minified version of jQuery 1.4a1 into a live application that you’re running. If you hit an exception or some weirdness occurs immediately login to the bug tracker and file a bug. Be sure to mention that you hit the bug in jQuery 1.4a1!

We’ll be closely monitoring the bug reports that come in and will work hard to fix any inconsistencies between jQuery 1.3.2 and jQuery 1.4.

What to Watch For

There are a few areas in jQuery that have seen extensive changes since 1.3.2 was released:

• live was drastically overhauled and now supports submit, change, mouseenter, mouseleave, focus, and blur events in all browsers. Also now supports context and data.
• append, prepend, etc. have been heavily optimized.
• add has been adjusted to always return elements in document order.
• find, empty, remove, addClass, removeClass, hasClass, attr, and css have been heavily optimized.

Full details concerning the release are forthcoming – for now we just need your help in catch regressions. Some more details can be found in John Resig’s keynote at the 2009 jQuery Conference.

Note: There are still a few open bugs that we will be reviewing before jQuery 1.4 final is released.

With your input we should be able to produce a solid release. Right now we’re looking to push out at least one more alpha before the holiday season and a final release candidate early in January. Thanks for your help in reviewing jQuery 1.4a1!

Word has just come in that jQuery has won the 2009 .Net Magazine Award for best Open Source Application. jQuery was in the final voting with Firefox and WordPress.

Simon Willison graciously accepted the award for the team:

This award really goes out to the whole jQuery community and all the contributors that made jQuery what it is today. Congratulations!

Want to make sure that your “favorite” jQuery bug is fixed in time for the upcoming 1.4 release? Then tell the jQuery dev team using the below form.

In a repeat of last year’s phenominal jQuery pumpkin Christopher Pickert is back with a brand new jQuery 1.3-using pumpkin that’s sure to frighten visitors:

Thanks again to Christopher for this great creation.

Environments for Humans is running a one-day, online conference focusing on jQuery. The conference will be on November 19th and will feature a number of prominent members of the jQuery community, including members of the jQuery team.

The following talks are slated for the jQuery Summit:

• The State of jQuery – John Resig
• Web Interface Essentials – Marc Grabanski
• RIAs: Building for the Desktop with the Web – Jonathan Snook
• Rich Interactivity, Simplified, with jQuery UI – Richard Worth
• Refactoring jQuery – Jonathan Sharp
• JavaScript for Designers – David McFarland
• Building Robust jQuery Plugins – Jörn Zaefferer
• jQuery Anti-Patterns for Performance & Compression – Paul Irish

While a number of these talks are reprisals from the recent jQuery conference, this event is not being run by the jQuery project. That being said, it looks like it’s going to be a lot of fun, and we encourage those that missed the conference in September to check it out.

All attendees will be receiving a free copy of the upcoming jQuery Cookbook, from O’Reilly. Additionally a number of prizes will be given away to attendees (books, DVDs, etc.).

Register for the jQuery Summit

There is a ticket discount in effect until October 30th. Additionally, if you register and use the discount code JQRYRESIGJ you’ll save an extra 10% off the overall price. A portion of the proceeds will be coming back to help fund the project.

Starting at 10PM MT on August 20th, code.jquery.com will start redirecting (301) to ajax.googleapis.com [http://code.google.com/apis/ajaxlibs/documentation/index.html#jquery].

Immediate Impact:

• None
• Redirection will occur using 301 “Permanent Moved”
• Packed version will be replaced with minified version

Long Term:

• Migrate any sites using code.jquery.com to Google’s AJAX Libraries API

Full documentation of Google’s Ajax API are available at http://code.google.com/apis/ajaxlibs/documentation/index.html#jquery. Continue reading →

Reminder: While the upcoming jQuery Conference is already sold out, we’re still looking for some excellent talks. We’re accepting talk proposals until the 15th. If your talk is accepted your ticket fee will be waived.

Even if you can’t make the jQuery Conference, though, there are a number of opportunities to meet members of the jQuery team, hear talks about jQuery, or generally mingle with other jQuery users coming up in the next couple months. If you happen to know of any other talks or events please comment below and we’ll add them.

• Workshop: Conquering jQuery with Karl Swedberg
  August 19th – 21st – Grand Rapids, MI
• User Group: ALT.NET: jQuery UI with Richard Worth
  August 26th – Washington, D.C.
• Conference: Epicenter
  August 26th – 28th – Ireland
• Meetup: North Carolina jQuery Camp
  September 19th – Durham, NC
• Workshop: jQuery Fundamentals
  September 25th – 26th – Carrboro, NC
• Conference: Stack Overflow Dev Days
  October 7th – November 2nd – Various Locations
• Conference: Fronteers 2009
  November 5th – 6th – Amsterdam
• Conference: JSConf.eu
  November 7th – 8th
• Workshop: How to use jQuery to enhance your web design with Karl Swedberg
  November 16th – New York, NY
• Conference: Full Frontal 2009
  November 20th – Brighton, UK
• Conference: Rich Web Experience – Richard Worth
  December 1st – 4th – Orlando, FL

Registration for the 2009 jQuery Conference is now open!

Register here:

http://events.jquery.com/

More information about the conference: Dates and Venue.

The agenda is still being worked on and will be announced shortly. It’s fully expected that the conference will sell out again (as it has every year, so far) so if you’re interested in coming please sign up sooner rather than later!

Good news everybody! The dates and venue for this year’s jQuery Conference have been determined.

The conference will be held September 12th and 13th at Microsoft Cambridge in Boston, MA.

This will be a 2 day conference with multiple tracks on each day. We’re in the process of planning out the schedule, talking with speakers, and setting up the conference web site.

Watch the jQuery blog or jQuery Twitter feed for notification when registration opens.

While this venue is larger than those that we’ve had in the past (Harvard Law School in ’07 and the MIT Stata Center in ’08) we do expect to sell out all the available seats, as has happened every year so far. That being said, the venue is quite incredible, easily one of the best spaces available for a conference:

A brief synopsis of some of the content that you’ll be able to expect:

The annual conference of jQuery users and developers. There will be talks on jQuery, jQuery UI, plugins, complex application development, and more – all from the top jQuery developers. Case studies from some of the leading users of jQuery will be included along with a 3 hour tutorial for those just getting started.

You can see the schedules from past jQuery conferences here: 2008, 2007. There will be a nominal fee (likely around $100-$150) to help us cover to cost of food for both days and shirts.

Looking forward to seeing everyone in Boston this fall!

Note: If you are interested in sponsoring the conference, please contact John Resig.

Update: There have been a lot of questions asking if there will be a conference on the west coast (San Francisco) or in Europe. While we don’t have any immediate plans to hold conferences in those locations, this year, we would like to hold them in the future. In the meantime I recommend checking out Full Frontal (UK, November) and Fronteers (Amsterdam, November) – both of which should shape up to be excellent JavaScript conferences.

Update: Thanks to Jeff for adding the event to Upcoming.