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New Release of LABjs Script Loader. Improved Chaining Support, Feature detection, DEBUG mode and more.

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Great news! Kyle Simpson, author of the highly popular and useful LABjs dynamic script loader, just tweeted out that he's released LABjs 2.0! Of course, I had a quick chat with him so he could give me the lowdown on the new release:

LABjs 2.0 is a full rewrite, emphasizing standardized and future thinking feature tests instead of hacks, readable source code, and several helpful new features. LABjs 2.0's goal is to be both a complete loader solution itself, as well as the building block for a variety of more complex dependency management solutions.

Cool new features include:

  • script() calls in the chain allow you to define one or more scripts to load in parallel
  • wait() calls in the chain allow you to express where execution order needs to wait to preserve dependency execution.
  • LABjs now uses standardized and future-thinking feature tests for preloading and ordered-execution loading, de-emphasizing hacky techniques like cache preloading (now only used in older legacy browsers).
  • The source code is vastly cleaner, and well commented
  • v2.0 is backwards-compatible for its API
  • Many bugs/quirks, including weirdness with "AllowDuplicates" and chain resumption, have been completely fixed
  • New features include "debug mode", built-in queueing, cache-busting, sandbox(), and noConflict()

You can check out the release notes for full details and nab a copy of the latest version here.