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TinyCore.js

No Maintenance Intended

Overview

TinyCore is a lightweight library that provides you a modular JavaScript architecture to create scalable, maintainable and fully tested web applications.

Main sources of inspiration :

"Scalable JavaScript Application Architecture", by Nicholas C. Zakas.

"Patterns For Large-Scale JavaScript Application Architecture", by Addy Osmani.

"The secret to building large apps is never build large apps. Break your applications into small pieces. Then, assemble those testable, bite-sized pieces into your big application" - Justin Meyer, author JavaScriptMVC.

Online demo : A simple todo list application. More demos in the "src/demos" folder.

Features

  • Around 3Kb minified, less than 1Kb gzipped
  • Extensible (currently 4 extensions exist)
  • Supports unit testing of the modules, with an extension dedicated to the Jasmine framework
  • Supports async modules loading using the Asynchronous Module Definition format and require.js
  • Works under IE8+, Safari 5.1, Opera 12, latest Chrome and Firefox
  • MIT-licensed

Benefits

  • Decoupled application architecture
  • Divide & conquer : each module implements only a functionality or a small set of functionalities
  • Modules are independent : change/removal/failure of one does not affect the others
  • Reusability : modules can be reused across a number of different applications
  • Testing : modules can be tested individually both inside and outside of the application

Usage

Include TinyCore.js :

	<script type="text/javascript" src="TinyCore.js"></script>

This will give you access to the global variable TinyCore and its components :

  • TinyCore.Module
  • TinyCore.Toolbox
  • TinyCore.Utils
  • TinyCore.Error

Description

We do not follow exactly the original idea from Nicholas Zakas. We use dependency injection to provide the modules the tools they need to perform their job. Instead of having a single sandbox object with a lot of methods, a module defines explicitly the tools it needs. The mediator, that provides a way of communication for the modules, is one of the default tools that has already been implemented (located in the "tools/mediator" folder).

Let's cover the following topics :

A. Modules : how to define a module, how to manage modules life cycles?

B. Toolbox : how to register tools that can help the modules do their job?

C. Utils : what is the set of existing utils?

D. Error and debugMode : how errors can be reported/logged?

A. Modules

A web application module is an independent unit of functionality in the page (HTML+CSS+JS) that creates a meaningful user experience.

Key concepts :

  • Loose coupling : any single module should be able to live on its own. Changes/removal of one module do not affect the others.
  • Each module has its own sandbox and needs to stay in it. The sandbox provides all the module needs to perform its job. In our case, the sandbox is not a single object. The sandbox is composed of a collection of objects that can be requested by the module, using dependency injection.

The modules are managed by the TinyCore.Module object. It can define, starts, stops or retrieve them.

TinyCore.Module API

TinyCore.Module.define( moduleName, toolsNames, creatorFunction )
TinyCore.Module.start( moduleName, startData )
TinyCore.Module.stop( moduleName, stopAndDestroy )
TinyCore.Module.instantiate( moduleName )
TinyCore.Module.getInstance( moduleName, instanceName )
TinyCore.Module.getModules()

Defining a module

A module can be defined for later use like this :

TinyCore.Module.define( 'elevator', [], function ()
{
	return {
		floor : null,
		/**
		 * This (mandatory) function will be called when the module is started.
		 * @param  {Object} oStartData The data passed when starting the module.
		 */
		onStart : function ( oStartData )
		{
			this.floor = oStartData.floor;
		},
		/**
		 * This (optional) function will be called when the module is stopped.
		 */
		onStop : function ()
		{
			// Cleanup (in order to be properly restarted?)
			this.floor = null;
		},
		/**
		 * This (optional) function will be called when the module is destroyed.
		 */
		onDestroy : function ()
		{
			// Complete cleanup!
			delete this.floor;
		},
		getFloor : function ()
		{
			return this.floor;
		}
	};
} );

Note that, although it's a best practice to provide all the onStart, onStop and onDestroy methods when defining a module, the only mandatory method you have to implement is onStart.

Defining a module that uses the Mediator tool

Let's use the previous example :

TinyCore.Module.define( 'elevator', [ 'mediator' ], function ( oMediator )
{
	return {
		floor : null,
		/**
		 * This (mandatory) function will be called when the module is started.
		 * @param  {Object} oStartData The data passed when starting the module.
		 */
		onStart : function ( oStartData )
		{
			this.floor = oStartData.floor;
			// Let's alert some text whenever the "elevator:call" topic is published.
			oMediator.subscribe( 'elevator:call', function ( oTopic )
			{
				alert( 'Elevator called from floor '+oTopic.data.callFloor );
			} );
		},
		/**
		 * This (optional) function will be called when the module is stopped.
		 */
		onStop : function ()
		{
			// Cleanup (in order to be properly restarted?)
			oMediator.unsubscribeAll();
			this.floor = null;
		},
		/**
		 * This (optional) function will be called when the module is destroyed.
		 */
		onDestroy : function ()
		{
			// Complete cleanup!
			delete this.floor;
		},
		getFloor : function ()
		{
			return this.floor;
		}
	};
} );

In this example, the Mediator tool has been requested by adding the 'mediator' string to the 2nd parameter of TinyCore.Module.define.

The Mediator tool registration can be done by including the "tools/mediator/TinyCore.Toolbox.Mediator.js" file.

See "B. Toolbox" for more information.

Starting/stopping a module

TinyCore.Module.start( 'elevator', { currentFloor : 2 } );
TinyCore.Module.stop( 'elevator' );
TinyCore.Module.start( 'elevator', { currentFloor : -1 } ); // restart

Destroying a module

When a module is no more needed in the application, you can destroy it by passing true as the 2nd parameter of TinyCore.Module.stop :

TinyCore.Module.stop( 'elevator', true );

It will be stopped and its definition will be removed from TinyCore. Both the onStop and the onDestroy methods will be called in the process.

Instantiating/testing a module

When starting a module for the first time, a new instance is created internally through the instantiate method. This method can also be used to test the module's behaviour. For example, using Jasmine's expectation syntax :

var oElevator = TinyCore.Module.instantiate( 'elevator' ),
	nCurrentFloor = oElevator.getFloor();

expect( nCurrentFloor ).toBeNull(); // true

oElevator.onStart( { floor : 3 } );

expect( oElevator.floor ).toBe( 3 ); // true

When setting TinyCore.debugMode to true, each module instantiated will have a special property named __tools__, which will be populated with the references to all the tools requested.

TinyCore.debugMode = true;

var oElevator = TinyCore.Module.instantiate( 'elevator' );

// "toBeObject" is an additional matcher defined in "test/TinyCore.SpecHelper.js"
expect( oElevator.__tools__ ).toBeObject(); // true
expect( oElevator.__tools__.mediator ).toBeObject(); // true

spyOn( oElevator.__tools__.mediator, 'publish' );

oElevator.onStart( { floor : 0 } );

expect( oElevator.__tools__.mediator.subscribe ).toHaveBeenCalled(); // true

An extension has been developed to automatically spy on the tools methods. See the "extensions/Jasmine" folder for more information (but read the next chapter first).

B. Toolbox

In order to provide the modules the tools they need to perform their job, TinyCore uses a tools factory, TinyCore.Toolbox.

A tool can be registered at any time for later use. Whenever a module is instantiated, the tools specified in the module definition will be requested and injected as parameters of the creator function.

TinyCore.Toolbox API

TinyCore.Toolbox.register( toolName, creatorFunction )
TinyCore.Toolbox.request( toolName )

Any tool that has already been registered can be requested by the module :

phone_tools.js :

TinyCore.Toolbox.register( 'camera', function ()
{
	return { takePhoto : function () {} };
} );
TinyCore.Toolbox.register( 'gps', function ()
{
	return { getActualLocation : function () {} };
} );
TinyCore.Toolbox.register( 'mp3', function ()
{
	return { play : function () {} };
} );

phone_module.js :

TinyCore.Module.define( 'phone', ['camera','gps','mp3','sensor'], function ( camera, gps, mp3, sensor )
{
	return {
		onStart : function ()
		{
			camera.takePhoto();
			gps.getActualLocation();
			mp3.play();
			// sensor is null
		}
	};
} );

Note : if a tool that has not been registered is requested, null will passed as the corresponding parameter of the creator function.

C. Utils

TinyCore comes with a set of built-in utilities functions that are used internally.

TinyCore.Utils API

TinyCore.Utils.extend( obj1, obj2 /*, ... */ )
TinyCore.Utils.forIn( obj, callback )
TinyCore.Utils.isClass( mixed, sClassName )
TinyCore.Utils.isArray( mixed )
TinyCore.Utils.isFunction( mixed )
TinyCore.Utils.isObject( mixed )
TinyCore.Utils.tryCatchDecorator( context, func, errMsg )
TinyCore.Utils.createModuleObject( creator, args )

D. Error and debugMode

TinyCore.Error is the core error handler.

The TinyCore.debugMode property defines how errors are reported.

TinyCore.Error API

TinyCore.Error.log()
TinyCore.Error.report()
TinyCore.debugMode = false

By default, all the methods of a module will be decorated by wrapping them into a "try-catch" statement. Should any error occur, it will be caught and logged by TinyCore.Error.log, which is just a wrapper over the console.error function.

If you do not want this decoration feature, set TinyCore.debugMode to true. It may be preferable when developing your application. Set it back to false in production.

The report method throws an exception when TinyCore.debugMode is true, or calls TinyCore.Error.log otherwise.

Feel free to extend/redefine those methods according to your needs.

Extensions

See the src/extensions folder for the documentation.

Bugs? Need help? Feedback?

Don't hesitate to e-mail me : web@sparring-partner.be

Thanks