Spark Toolbox

The toolbox is a small collection of tools (and polyfils) to simplify front-end development.

This library uses polyfills to add native support for Element.classlist(), Element.closest(), Element.matches(), and Object.assign.

Dom Tools

Simple tools for working with the DOM.

• getClosest(el, selector) - Provides browser support for Element.cloest() - a DOM method that returns the current element if it matches the given selector, or else the closest ancestor element that matches the given selector, or else null.
• childOf(el, parent) - Returns true if an element is a child of another element.
• isElement(el) - Returns true if an object is of type HTML Element.
• formData(el) - Returns formData for ajax form submission, assembled from all inputs beneath a given element. If any input is disabled or a child of a [disabled] element, they are omitted.
• scrollTo(to, options) - This scrolls the document (or an element) to a y-coordinate or another element with an ease function.

scrollTo Arguments:

• to - a y-coordinate or DOM element.

Options:

• callback: function - function to trigger on complete
• duration: 500 - time in milliseconds to scroll (default: 500)
• scroll: element - element to scroll (default: document root)

Object Tools

Simple tools to make working with objects easier.

merge(object, object, [object, …])

This relies on Object.assign and exists becuase Object.assign modifies the first object in the arguments, which isn't often what I want. This merges objects, returning a new merged object without modifying any object passed.

Object.assign(a, b)      // Returns `a`, merged with `b` but modifies references to `a`.
Object.assign({}, a, b)  // Equivilent to `merge(a, b)`, does not modify either object.

The second option is often what I want, but it looks very strange to merge objects with an empty object. This is where I wish Javascript worked like Ruby and I could have merge and merge!. Alas.

slice(obj, [length])

Easy access to Array.prototype.slice for converting objects into arrays of values which is useful for casting collections of DOM tree nodes.

each(obj, func)

Under the hood this maps to Array.prototype.forEach.call(obj, func), which is casts DOM tree nodes as an array before iterating. It mostly exists to improve the readabilty of code.