RequireJS 0.11.0 Released

RequireJS 0.11.0 is available to download! This release has the following enhancements:

• There is a new priority config option to indicate priority, parallel download of build layers.
• A new JSONP plugin allows you to treat any JSONP service as dependency.
• require.js should be Caja-compliant. The plugins may not be, but the main require.js file passed cajoling on http://caja.appspot.com/.
• Instructions and optimization support for renaming require().
• There is a new RequireJS+Transport D download option that supports the CommonJS Transport D proposal. This can be useful in conjunction with the server-side Transporter project.

Thanks to Alex Sexton for outlining the Caja and require() renaming aspects and to Sean J. Vaughan for instigating the JSONP plugin.

The priority config option is the parallel download support I mentioned in the "A require() for jQuery" post. I now believe RequireJS meets all the requirements outlined in that post.

Some icing on the cake I want to pursue: a server-based service that can create optimization layers on the fly. I have all the pieces in place in the optimization tool to allow this, and I previously built a server build option for Dojo. With that, you could conceivably use the priority config support with a server that did the optimization layers on the fly:

require({
  priority: [
      "http://your.domain.com/opt?include=event,object,widget,Dialog&exclude=jquery",
      "http://your.domain.com/opt?include=page1,Tabs&exclude=jquery,event,object,widget,Dialog&exclude=jquery"
  ]
}, ["page1"]);

Or something like that. The fun part -- this server endpoint would use server-side JavaScript, since the optimization tool in RequireJS is built in JavaScript. I could use Node or something Rhino-based. It is likely to be Rhino-based since that allows the minifier, Closure Compiler, to work on the fly, since Closure Compiler is written in Java.

That server-based service will likely take a more design work and thought, but if you feel it is something necessary for your project, please let me know. Better yet, if you want to contribute to the project in this area, leave a note on the mailing list.