jQuery Plugin options

Question

The user can provide a JSON object to configure the plugin when they initialise it. I want those options to be available whenever a plugin action is performed.

I have read the plugin documentation but I'd like to get confirmation that I am going about this the right way.

Plugin is initialised with:

$(selector).hide_and_peek("init", {options:here});

And individual methods may be called with:

$(selector).hide_and_peek("action", {options:here});

Here's the plugin definition:

(function( $ ) {

// Plugin definition.
$.fn.hide_and_peek = function(action,  options ) {

    //define plugin defaults.
    $.fn.hide_and_peek.defaults = {
        peek_offset: -10,
        peek_position: "bottom",
        default_shown: true,
        peek_show_duration:1000,
        peek_hide_duration:1000,
        center: true
    }; 

    //check to see if options are provided and extend if required.
    $.fn.hide_and_peek.custom = function(){
        if(typeof options === "undefined"){
            return $.fn.hide_and_peek.custom;
        }else{
            return $.fn.extend($.fn.hide_and_peek.custom,options);
        }
    }();

    //merge defaults and custom options
    var oOptions = $.fn.extend({}, $.fn.hide_and_peek.defaults, $.fn.hide_and_peek.custom);

    // *snip* Plugin implementation
})( jQuery );

Answer 1

I am writing (my first) jQuery plugin.

Congratulations!

The user can provide a JSON object to configure the plugin when they initialise it.

Terminology is wrong here. JSON is the transport format that looks like a JS object, but serialized into a string. What you use is just a JS object. They look the same because JSON was modeled after the JS literal notation, which (historically) was easily "unserialized" (turned back into an object) with eval. Proper parsers came in later on.

//check to see if options are provided and extend if required.
$.fn.hide_and_peek.custom = function(){
    if(typeof options === "undefined"){
        return $.fn.hide_and_peek.custom;
    }else{
        return $.fn.extend($.fn.hide_and_peek.custom,options);
    }
}();

//merge defaults and custom options
var oOptions = $.fn.extend({}, $.fn.hide_and_peek.defaults, $.fn.hide_and_peek.custom);

So I assume custom is another level of options, maybe set during setup and globally for all instances of the plugin. You don't need to check if it's undefined. You can just merge it in. jQuery will take care of it being undefined and will just skip over it.

// Last will take precedence
var oOptions = $.fn.extend({}, defaults, custom, options);