Having been developing web sites for over 8 years - I’ve learned the invaluableness of tools that help speed the production cycle. I believe in the need to know how things work, but at the same time the concept of working smarter, not harder is essential to anyone who is looking to maximize their productivity - especially when they are billing for themselves.

Along with the base jquery library, here are some of the plugins that I make use of on a more regular basis:

Dimensions by Paul Bakaus and Brandon Aaron
Dimensions is an official extension to JQuery, and allows you to easily get the positioning of any element on the page, along with its height and width. This is incredibly useful for modal dialogue boxes, error messages, etc.

Interface authored by Stefan Petre and Paul Bakaus.
Interface is the mother of all JQuery plugins, with features ranging from animation effects, to drag and drop. The whole package is 72k, but the best part is the authors allow you to grab just the parts you need for what you want to do.

Calendar authored by Marc Grabanski and extended by Keith Wood
I was in the process of writing my own JQuery based calendar when this was released. I immediately scrapped my production for their version, which makes entering dates a breeze. The many configuration options are quite nice as well.

JQuery Curvycorners - I’m trying to find the link to this, as it is no longer on the jquery plugins page. I’ll update once I do. This plugin makes rounded corners a breeze, plus it works in all major browsers AND allows borders and flows OVER background images without a problem. This plugin looks like it may be worthwhile in the meantime - as it uses canvas to draw the corners. I haven’t tried it out yet though.

Another In-Place Editor by Dave Hauenstein
I made some modifications to this to add external field validation and inline image uploading (which I’ll probably post at some point in the future). This plugin is great on its own, and very easy to extend. In case you hadn’t guessed - it allows in-place form field editing.

Highlightfade by Blair Mitchelmore
Simple method to show your users that something AJAXy has happened.

Tooltip by Joern Zaefferer
Allows highly customizable creation of tooltips to suit nearly any need.

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