Hacker News Reader

It's much easier to make jQuery UI modular than it is to make jQuery core modular. You know that you're using autocomplete, tabs, sliders, or dialogs; you can see them on the screen. If you're including jQuery core with several jQuery plugins it won't always be clear which parts of jQuery core you are using, either directly or through those plugins. If you already know your project's dependencies, the grunt build option in 1.8 gives you that flexibility now so there's no need to wait. If you don't know those dependencies, a page of check boxes will just make creating and debugging a working build more frustrating. Closure Compiler Advanced Optimizations promise to automate that process, but we still have a way to go on getting that integrated into jQuery.

They've made the build tools modular using grunt.

Considering that they have custom download options for jQuery UI and recently added a tool for jQuery Mobile (http://jquerymobile.com/download-builder/), I expect it won't be many more months before they add one to jquery.com.

jquip (aka jQuery in parts): https://github.com/mythz/jquip

Does include an online builder at: http://jquip.ubixar.com/ It's also the only version of jQuery to support Google Closure's advanced compilation mode.

Anyway, I'm happy to see jQuery moving into a smaller more modular code-base.