I posted earlier this month about JQuery – and how it can help you write less JavaScript code and get more done. The JQuery team today announced via their blog that both Microsoft and Nokia have adopted JQuery as part of their application development platform:
We have two pieces of fantastic, albeit serendipitous, news today: Both Microsoft and Nokia are taking the major step of adopting jQuery as part of their official application development platform. Not only will they be using it for their corporate development but they will be providing it as a core piece of their platform for developers to build with.
Microsoft is looking to make jQuery part of their official development platform. Their JavaScript offering today includes the ASP.NET Ajax Framework and they’re looking to expand it with the use of jQuery. This means that jQuery will be distributed with Visual Studio (which will include jQuery intellisense, snippets, examples, and documentation).
Additionally Microsoft will be developing additional controls, or widgets, to run on top of jQuery that will be easily deployable within your .NET applications. jQuery helpers will also be included in the server-side portion of .NET development (in addition to the existing helpers) providing complementary functions to existing ASP.NET AJAX capabilities.
Nokia is looking to use jQuery to develop applications for their WebKit-based Web Run-Time. The run-time is a stripped-down browser rendering engine that allows for easy, but powerful, application development. This means that jQuery will be distributed on all Nokia phones that include the web run-time.
You can find the full post here.
This is both great news for JQuery and for developers – and here is why. This will enable significant growth of the JQuery ecosystem – particularly where mobile browsers are concerned. Safari – on the iPhone – already cleanly supports JQuery – and this move indicates that Pocket IE and the Symbian browser will also cleanly support JQuery. This will make JQuery the dominant JavaScript framework for mobile devices.
If you haven’t tried JQuery – you should.