bigskysoftware/intercooler-js

★ 4,787HTMLAudience · developerComplexity · 2/5LicenseSetup · easy

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((repo))
    What it does
      HTML-over-the-wire
      Attribute-driven Ajax
      Server-rendered updates
    Features
      Request triggers
      Progress indicators
      Dependency refresh
      History integration
    Use Cases
      Dynamic page updates
      Form submissions
      Auto-refresh sections
    Tech Stack
      JavaScript
      jQuery
      HTML attributes
    Status
      Archived project
      Succeeded by htmx

mindmap root((repo)) What it does HTML-over-the-wire Attribute-driven Ajax Server-rendered updates Features Request triggers Progress indicators Dependency refresh History integration Use Cases Dynamic page updates Form submissions Auto-refresh sections Tech Stack JavaScript jQuery HTML attributes Status Archived project Succeeded by htmx

Click or tap to explore — scroll the page freely

Things people build with this

USE CASE 1

Add a button that fetches an HTML fragment from your server and swaps it into the page without writing any JavaScript

USE CASE 2

Build a form that submits to a server endpoint and replaces a page section with the server HTML response, no client-side rendering

USE CASE 3

Set up one section of the page to auto-refresh when a related section changes, using the dependency mechanism

USE CASE 4

Add browser history integration to page-update interactions so the back button still works as expected

Tech stack

JavaScriptjQueryHTML

Getting it running

Difficulty · easy Time to first run · 5min

Project is archived, htmx is the active successor with no jQuery dependency and broader feature support.

Use freely for any purpose including commercial projects, as long as you keep the copyright notice.

In plain English

Intercooler.js is a small JavaScript library that lets you add dynamic behavior to web pages by writing HTML attributes rather than JavaScript code. The core idea is that you annotate existing HTML elements with special attributes, and the library handles sending requests to your server and updating the page with whatever the server sends back. A button with an attribute pointing to a URL will, when clicked, automatically contact that URL and swap the response into the page, with no JavaScript required from you. This approach is sometimes called HTML-over-the-wire: instead of having the browser download data in JSON and then render it with JavaScript, the server sends back ready-to-display HTML fragments, and the library slots them into the right place on the page. It can feel closer to the original model of how websites worked, but with the smooth no-reload experience users expect from modern apps. Beyond the basic request-and-swap, intercooler supports specifying which user action should trigger a request (not just clicks), showing progress indicators while requests are in flight, custom server-sent response headers that trigger client-side actions like redirects, a dependency mechanism so one part of the page can automatically refresh when a related part changes, and browser history integration so the back button still works as expected. The library is 6.74 KB compressed and depends on jQuery version 1.10 or higher. It is licensed under the MIT license and can be added to a project via Bower or by downloading it directly. Important context: intercooler is no longer the active project. Version 2.0 was renamed htmx and released as a separate library that drops the jQuery dependency and offers a broader feature set. The intercooler repository is effectively the historical archive of what became htmx. If you are starting a new project, the README itself points you to the htmx repository instead.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1

Add an intercooler.js attribute to a button so clicking it fetches /api/results and replaces a div with the returned HTML

Prompt 2

Use intercooler ic-trigger-on to make a section reload when the user scrolls to the bottom of the page

Prompt 3

Configure intercooler.js so updating one counter section automatically refreshes a dependent totals section

Prompt 4

Migrate a basic intercooler.js attribute setup to htmx, which attributes changed names and which concepts map directly?

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