By: Tim Nash

Let it never be said that if I see a bandwagon I don't jump on...

Why Javascript in the first place

Javascript and Search Engine Optimisation rarely if ever meet, simply because on the whole Javascript is not indexed by the major search engines in any meaningful way and so for most SEOs what it does is outside of our scope. When Javascript does effect us it is normally because some data we do want to be exposed to search engines is locked in the Javascript. This causes a boiling blood sensation which is why most SEOs have grown to loathe Javascript in all its forms.

Our beef shouldn't however be with Javscript but the designers, in traditional Web Design you design your site to work with the newest browsers and then hack it to work with others this is called graceful degradation but more accurately should be called disaster waiting to happen. Instead a more sensible approach would be progressive enhancement where you start with the lowest common denominator (1 down from a search engine) and build the site so that it is fully functional and then add your enhancements. This means for one thing all the data you wish to be exposed will be available.

JQuery the SEO friend

JQuery is built on the concept of progressive enhancement it builds on top of the DOM layer and uses selectors to trigger code. It also simplifies a lot of tedious jobs indeed the makers claim you can halve the amount of code used in traditional Javscript coding. So what are you waiting for? One of the best resources all be it on the small size is JQuery for Designers recommended by Chris from CSS Tricks.

Now this is the point where I highlight some really cool and amazing effects and say look at how pretty they are and you all um and arrrhhh at them. Well instead I'm going to concentrate on just a couple of useful plugins for SEOs if you want to see the pretty stuff I suggest here, here and here.

Useful Jquery Plugins

JQuery Flash Plugin
If SEO don't like Javascript they hate Flash but the good news is that using Flash substitution techniques we can still provide some SEO benefits. While perhaps not a full replacement for SWFObject this plugin is it JQuery equivalent. It is not as versatile, lacking mobile support being the obvious missing feature but it has I think neater code. I have been using this on several client sites with great effect.

GA Tracker
Continuing the theme here is the JQuery version of the standard Google Analytics code. I found most stats analysts simply stick code in their sites without ever really understanding what it does so if your learning to use Javascript through JQuery it's worth having your common scripts written in a similar manner. You never know you might start playing with some of the more useful features.

JModal
Ok so this one is a fancy script but remarkably useful for creating error messages to lightbox effect. Jquery Modal provides a modal box (where a box appears detached from the site often with a greyed background) which can be styled through css and includes 7 main variants enough for even the most fashion concious designer. Alternatively you could look at Facebox based around Facebook modal look.

Flot
Graphing made easy for those who don't want to go down the Flash route or Google nice Chart API Flot is a good alternative, I would like to see more in the way of a mechanism to use the page to hold the data rather then relying purely on external sources. Still a minor thing Flot is still very much a work in development.

Form Validation
One of the traditional uses of Javascript this super easy form validation script works via CSS selectors to determine which fields contain what type of data. The ability to add custom rules makes it a breeze to validate almost any form. Works particularly well when combined with user name availability script.

Of course Javascript has made its come back partly due to AJAX so no round up would be complete without a tutorial on using JQuery and PHP to create AJAX calls to a database. If you come up with a great solution based on JQuery the nice thing is you don't need to keep it to yourself you can distribute it as a plugin their are several guides out their I think this one is one of the best JQuery Plugin Development.

Which JQuery Plugins do you use and why?