Friday 13 January 2012

jQuery code assist in Eclipse 3.7


This is something I have wanted for ages. jQuery code assist AKA code completion AKA autocomplete AKA intellisense, in my favourite IDE Eclipse.
  1. Install Aptana 3 plugin: go Help > Install New Software, and use this URL: http://download.aptana.com/studio3/plugin/install
  2. Enable jQuery bundle: make sure you are using the Aptana ("Web") perspective and go Commands > Bundle Development > Install Bundle > jQuery
  3. Use the Aptana JavaScript editor, rather than the default Eclipse / WTP one: go Window > Preferences > General > Editors > File Associations, and click *.js and then make the "JavaScript Source Editor" the default.

And that should be it - open a JavaScript file, and type $("input").cli and then hit Space and it should automatically add the code for a jQuery click() event handler.


ALTERNATIVE
You could also try jQueryWTP, or JSDT jQuery which is available in the Eclipse Marketplace, but I have no experience with these. Please add comments if you these plugins are actually any good.

REFERENCES
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4721124/how-to-enable-jquery-support-in-aptana-studio-3

Wednesday 11 January 2012

Google Analytics: track clicks on #hash anchor links

If on your website you want to treat different page anchors as different pages (e.g. if you load your pages using Ajax), then you need a way to tell GA (Google Analytics) about this. Unfortunately there's no simple settings change you can make in the GA tracking code snippet - you actually have to run some GA code yourself when the event occurs. It turns out this is quite simple:

_gaq.push(['_trackPageview', location.pathname + location.search + location.hash]);

But where do you use this? You could add it to the click event (either in your JavaScript, or in the markup, using the onClick attribute). But if you want a global solution, you need to fire it for all hashchanges. This can be done using the jQuery hashchange plugin:

$(window).hashchange(function() {
    // put any other hashchange magic you might want to do here
    _gaq.push(['_trackPageview', location.pathname + location.search + location.hash]);
});

REFERENCES
http://www.searchenginepeople.com/blog/how-to-track-clicks-on-anchors-in-google-analytics.html