Ity

A miniscule, dependency free JavaScript MVC

Why?

• Tiny footprint for mobile networks (~5kb minified)
• Extremely fast DOM query/selection engine. No need for jQuery! (for DOM selection)
• Mobile first - no legacy hackery for ie < 10.
• Great for spinning up small, mobile-specific apps

Installation

npm install ity

Basic Usage

const myApp = new Ity.Application();
const myModel = new Ity.Model();
const myCollection = new Ity.Collection([myModel]);
const myView = new Ity.View({
  el: '.someElement',
  app: myApp,
  model: myModel,
  events: {
    '.btn': {
      click: 'onBtnClick',
      hover: 'onBtnHover',
    },
    '.fancyBtn': {
      click: 'onFancyBtnClick',
      focus: 'onFancyBtnFocus',
    },
  },

  initialize(options?: unknown) {
    this.model.on('change', this.render, this);
  },

  render() {
    this.select('.myContainer').html(this.model.get('someData'));
  },

  onBtnClick(evt: Event) {
    const output = this.select('#difWithId').find('.output');

    output.html('<div><p>Click!</p></div>');
  },

  // ... more click, hover, focus events from events hash
});

const router = new Ity.Router();
router.addRoute('/users/:id', params => {
  console.log('Showing user', params.id);
});
router.navigate('/users/5');

App

• App.getView(id) - returns Ity.View instance by id
• App.addView(view) - add Ity.View instance to internal views array
• App.removeView(id) - remove Ity.View instance from internal views array by id
• App.trigger(evtName, data) -- trigger event by name on Application level. Optionally pass data

Model

• Model.initialize(options) - called on instantiation of Model instances, optional options hash can be passed
• Model.get(someDataPoint) - get value from internal data object hash by key
• Model.set(someDataPoint, data) - set value of internal data object by key
• Model.unSet(someDataPoint) - clear out valye of interanl data objecy by key
• Model.clear() - clear entire internal data objecy
• Model.on(eventName, callback) - listen to Model instance events and call callback function
• Model.off(eventName?, callback?) - remove Model instance event listener(s)
• Model.sync(options) - sync data in internal data object. Optionally pass options hash for url, type, success, error
• Model.trigger(eventName, data) - trigger event by name on Model instance and optionally pass data

Collection

• Collection.add(model) - add an Ity.Model instance to the collection
• Collection.get(id) - return a model by id if present
• Collection.remove(id) - remove a model from the collection by id
• Collection.at(index) - return model at a given index
• Collection.length - number of models in the collection
• Collection.clear() - remove all models
• Collection.find(fn) - return the first model matching fn
• Collection.filter(fn) - return an array of models matching fn
• Collection.toJSON() - array of each model's data
• Collection.fetch(opts) - populate models from an AJAX request
• Collection.trigger(eventName, data) - trigger event on all models in the collection

View

• View.initialize(options) - called on instantiation of View instances, optional options hash can be passed
• View.getName() - return name attribute of view
• View.get(key) - return attribute of view by key String
• View.set(key, value) - set attribute of view to passed value
• View.on(eventName, callback) - listen to View instance events and call callback function
• View.off(eventName?, callback?) - remove View instance event listener(s)
• View.remove() - Remove internal el element and remove view from app
• View.trigger(eventName, data) - trigger event by name on View instance and optionally pass data
• View.select(DOMquery) - select DOM elements within set el object.

Router

• Router.addRoute(pattern, handler) - register a URL pattern and callback. Dynamic segments prefixed with : become params.
• Router.navigate(path) - update the history state and dispatch the matching route.
• Router.start() - start listening for popstate events (called automatically on creation).
• Router.stop() - stop listening for URL changes.
• Query string (?foo=bar) and hash (#section=2) parameters are parsed and merged into the handler's params object.

const router = new Ity.Router();
router.addRoute('/users/:id', params => {
  console.log('Showing user', params.id);
});
router.navigate('/users/5');

The Selection Engine and Selector object

Based on jQuery's DOM querying. Selection is done from within a View instance.

const myView = new Ity.View({
  el: '.someDiv',
  render() {
    // view.select will default to interacting with only the el and its children
    this.select('.someChildofSomeDiv').html('<p>Hello, View!</p>');
  },
});

myView.select('<CSS Selector>').html(htmlContent);

Chaining

const myView = new Ity.View({ el: '.parentDiv' });
myView
  .select('.myDiv')
  .append('<p>Hi!</p>')
  .parent()
  .find('.myOtherDiv')
  .remove();

Selections

• find
• filter
• first
• last
• parent
• children
• remove
• before
• after
• append
• prepend
• html
• addClass
• removeClass
• toggleClass
• hasClass

Building locally

Once you have the repository cloned:

cd your/directory/Ity
npm install
npm run build

This creates dist/ity.js, dist/ity.min.js and module builds in dist/ity.esm.js and dist/ity.cjs.js, along with their source maps. A declaration file dist/ity.d.ts is also generated. You can verify the minified build works by running:

npm run test:dist

Running tests

Compile the source files and run the test suite with:

npm test

This command uses a pretest hook to build the project and then runs the Jest test runner. A coverage report can also be generated with:

npm run coverage

License

The MIT License (MIT)

Copyright (c) 2025 Dominic Cocchiarella

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.