WinJS 3.0 is Here: Cross-browser| Cross-platform

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The Windows Library for JavaScript (WinJS) project is pleased to announce the general availability of its first release – WinJS 3.0 – since the open source project began at //BUILD 2014. The WinJS 3.0 release offers customers:

  • Cross-browser/cross-platform support spanning the most popular desktop and mobile browsers, as well as HTML-based app environments like Apache Cordova
  • JavaScript modularization giving developers the control to optimize their performance and load just the modules of the WinJS library they need for their web site or app
  • Improved universal control designs delivering a more seamless experience for end users across Phone, Tablet, and PC device form factors of various screen sizes and input types

WinJS is available now for developers to try in their favorite browser at try.buildwinjs.com. The WinJS team focused the last five months on making WinJS 3.0 run seamlessly across platforms and browsers. This means that you can now use WinJS not only for your Universal Windows Apps, but also for your web sites, and when building HTML-based mobile apps across various platforms using technologies like Apache Cordova. See our wiki for WinJS’s full matrix of browser and operating system support. Major items we addressed in the 3.0 release include cross-platform infrastructure improvements for layout, keyboarding, string localization, and support for right-to-left languages; a comprehensive unit test suite that runs on our components for major operating systems and browsers; and design updates to the custom WinJS controls and intrinsic HTML controls ensure a consistent user experience on many platforms and browsers.

Here are some of the updates from WInJS 2.0 to WinJS 3.0:

Adding a font containing symbols to the WinJS repository so that symbols used in AppBar, NavBar, FlipView, Ratings, Hub, and SearchBox now render on many operating systems and browsers. See the example below of the Ratings control.

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ListView now renders the Grid and List layouts on all platforms. The CSS Grid dependency was removed so that ListView with groups is now supported.

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Input range, the intrinsic HTML slider control and other intrinsic controls, got a cross-platform facelift.

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NavBar has an improved layout since the dependency on CSS Grid was removed.

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Searchbox suggestions now display on many platforms since a shim was created to support the suggestions API.

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Toggle switch no longer takes a dependency on the intrinsic HTML slider and is fully functional and visually appealing on all platforms.

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See more detail at Windows post at WinJS Everywhere

Developers are also encouraged to continue sharing feedback and contributions to the WinJS open-source library on GitHub.