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MooTools Kwicks Plugin

I wrote a post titled Get Slick with MooTools Kwicks ages ago. The post was quite popular and the effect has been used often. Looking back now, the original code doesn't look as clean as it could. I've revised the original Kwicks code so that Kwicks is laid out in the form of a standard MooTools plugin.

The HTML

<div id="kwick">
	<ul id="kwicks">
		<li><a class="kwick john" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_lennon" title="John Lennon"><span>John Lennon</span></a></li>
		<li><a class="kwick paul" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_mccartney" title="Paul McCartney"><span>Paul McCartney</span></a></li>
		<li><a class="kwick george" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_harrison" title="George Harrison"><span>George Harrison</span></a></li>
		<li><a class="kwick ringo" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ringo_starr" title="Ringo Starr"><span>Ringo Starr</span></a></li>
	</ul>
</div>

The Kwicks system works based off of an HTML list containing list items with links.

The CSS

#kwick						{ width:590px; }
	#kwicks 				{ height:143px; list-style-type:none; margin:0; padding:0; }
#kwick li 					{ float:left; }
#kwick .kwick 				{ display:block; cursor:pointer; overflow:hidden; height:143px; width:134px; }
#kwick .kwick span 			{ display:none; }

#kwick .john 				{ background:url(kwicks/john.gif) no-repeat; }
#kwick .paul 				{ background:url(kwicks/paul.gif) no-repeat; }
#kwick .george 				{ background:url(kwicks/george.gif) no-repeat; }
#kwick .ringo 				{ background:url(kwicks/ringo.gif) no-repeat; }

The most key of the selectors is ".kwick" which features "overflow:hidden". Overflow hidden will allow our squeezing of elements.

The MooTools JavaScript

var Kwicks = new Class({
	
	Implements: [Options],
	
	options: {
		squeezeWidth: 100,
		maxWidth: 285
	},
	
	initialize: function(list,options) {
		this.setOptions(options);
		this.list = document.id(list);
		this.parse();
	},
	
	parse: function() {
		//vars
		var items = this.list.getElements('a'),
			fx = new Fx.Elements(items, {wait: false, duration: 250, transition:Fx.Transitions.Cubic.easeOut}),
			startWidths = [],
			options = this.options;
		//kwicks items
		items.each(function(item,i) {
			startWidths.push(item.getStyle('width').toInt());
			item.addEvent('mouseenter',function(){
				var fxSettings = {};
				fxSettings[i] = {
					'width': [item.getStyle('width').toInt(),options.maxWidth]
				};
				items.each(function(sibling,ii) {
					if(sibling != item) {
						var w = sibling.getStyle('width').toInt();
						if (w != options.squeezeWidth) {
							fxSettings[ii] = {
								'width': [w,options.squeezeWidth] 
							};
						}
					}
				},this);
				fx.start(fxSettings);
			},this);
		},this);
		//list
		this.list.addEvent('mouseleave',function() {
			var fxSettings = {};
			items.each(function(item,i) {
				fxSettings[i] = {
					width: [item.getStyle('width').toInt(), startWidths[i]]
				};
			});
			fx.start(fxSettings);
		});
	}
});

/* USAGE */
window.addEvent('domready',function() {
	var kwicks = new Kwicks('kwicks');
});

Unlike my original post, this implementation works off of the MooTools Class system. The class is small and features only one real method but the class' code is also much cleaner than my original implementation!

The Kwicks effect is tasteful, smooth, and attention-grabbing. I recommend adding this to any website that could use a bit of dynamism.

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