The argument parser's API

Patterns can usually be configured to change their behaviour. This is done by passing arguments to the parser in data-pat-* attributes or by using an internal javascript API. All processing of arguments is done by the argument parser. Using the parser is easy:

var parser = new ArgumentParser("tooltip");
parser.addArgument("delay", 150);
parser.addArgument("loop", false);
parser.addArgument("next-label", "Next");

$("[data-pat-tooltip]").each(function() {
    var options = parser.parse($(this));
    ...
});

Lines 1-4 show how to create a new argument parser instance for our pattern, tell it about the options we want to handle and provide some default values. The code then finds all elements in the document with a data-pat-tooltip attribute and uses the argument parser to parse the value.

The parser combines values from multiple sources. In order of priority they are:

  1. options passed in to the parse() call
  2. options for the data-pat-<name> attribute of the parsed element
  3. options for the data-pat-<name> attribute of all parent elements
  4. default values provided in the add_argument() call

Parser API

ArgumentParser(name)

:param string name: name of the pattern

Create a new argument parser instance. The pattern name is used to find the right attribute to parse for elements.

  • ArgumentParser.addArgument(name[, default[, choices[, multiple]]])

    Parameters:

    • name (String): argument name
    • default: default value
    • choices (Array): list of acceptable values
    • multiple: (Boolean) flag indicating if argument is a list of values

    Register a new argument. The default value will be used if no value was found during parsing, and is used to determine what data type should be used.

    As a special feature you can define an argument-alias as default value by using a $<argument name> as default value. In that case if no value for the argument was provided a copy of the referenced argument will be used.

    The default value can also be a function taking a jQuery wrapped element and the parameter name as arguments and which returns a default value.

      parser.addArgument("delay", function($el, name) {
      return 500;
  });

  • ArgumentParser.parse($el [, options][, multiple])

    Parameters:

    • $el: (jQuery object) for element to parse
    • options (Object): default values to use
    • multiple (Boolean): flag indicating if multiple values should be returned.

    This method returns the configuration for a pattern from an object. You can optionally provide options that will override default values and values found on the element.

    If you use argument groups (multiple parameters that share a prefix) their options will be returned as a sub-object. For example a parser with these arguments:

      parser.addArgument("selector", ".pattern");
  parser.addArgument("control-arrows", false);
  parser.addArgument("control-links", true);
  parser.addArgument("control-index", false);

    will return an object like this:

      {
      selector: ".pattern",
      control: {
          arrows: false,
          links: true,
          index: false
      }
  }
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