jQuery Flipster is a CSS3 3D transform-based jQuery plugin that replicates the familiar 'cover flow' effect and now features a 'carousel' effect! It's responsive, so it will automatically center itself and scale down to fit the area provided. It likes to be playfully touched on mobile browsers. It degrades (vaguely) gracefully, falling back to being just as flat and boring as the browsers that don't support 3D transforms. Its only dependency is jQuery and it sets up in seconds. It's pretty rad.

At this point you're probably saying 'ZOMG JQUERY FLIPSTER WHERE HAVE U BEEN ALL MY LIFE???'. I would be if I were you. So your project needs some sweet, sweet coverflow loving. You've come to the right place.

The slider can be operated with arrow keys, clicks, side to side scrolling or by touch on mobile devices. Wrapping the image elements in anchor tags also works to enable linking out from the current element.

Live demo: http://brokensquare.com/Code/jquery-flipster/demo/

Tested in:

• Chrome (latest)
• Safari & Mobile Safari (latest)
• Firefox (latest) (no mousewheel, no box reflections)
• IE 10 (no mousewheel, no box reflections)

Latest Version Untested in:

• IE 8 & 9 (no 3D transforms, 'compatibility mode')
• IE <= 7
• Android browsers
• Opera

Include the CSS (ideally in the header)

<link rel="stylesheet" href="css/flipster.css">

Set up your image list like so:

<div class="flipster">
	<ul>
		<li><img src="" alt="" /></li>
		...
	</ul>
</div>

Include the Javascript after jQuery (ideally at the bottom of the page before the </body> tag

<script src="//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.10.2/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script>window.jQuery || document.write('<script src="/js/jquery-1.10.2.min.js"><\/script>')</script>
<script src="/js/jquery.flipster.js"></script>

Initialize the script:

$(function(){ $('.flipster').flipster(); });

• itemContainer Container for the items to flipsterfy. Default is 'ul'
• itemSelector Children of itemContainer to flipsterfy. Default is 'li'
• style Switch between 'coverflow' or 'carousel' display styles Default is 'coverflow'
• start Set to a number to have Flipster start centered on that item, or set to 'center' to start in the middle
• enableKeyboard If true, the left and right arrow keys will navigate through the list. Default is 'true'
• enableMousewheel If true, the mousewheel will scroll through the list. Default is 'true'
• enableTouch If true, touch swipes will scroll through the list. Default is 'true'
• enableNav If true, Flipster will insert an unordered list of the items' categories and titles to allow for direct navigation and give you a visual walk through of the items. Default is 'false'
• enableNavButtons If true, Flipster will insert "Previous" and "Next" links to go left or right in the list. Default is 'false'

• onItemSwitch Called whenever an item is switched

If you want to change options, add the parameters when initializing the script. Default values are shown below

$(function(){ 
	$('.flipster').flipster({
		itemContainer:			'ul', // Container for the flippin' items.
		itemSelector:				'li', // Selector for children of itemContainer to flip
		style:							'coverflow', // Switch between 'coverflow' or 'carousel' display styles
		start:							'center', // Starting item. Set to 0 to start at the first, 'center' to start in the middle or the index of the item you want to start with.
		
		enableKeyboard:			true, // Enable left/right arrow navigation
		enableMousewheel:		true, // Enable scrollwheel navigation (up = left, down = right)
		enableTouch:				true, // Enable swipe navigation for touch devices
		
		enableNav:					false, // If true, flipster will insert an unordered list of the slides
		enableNavButtons:		false, // If true, flipster will insert Previous / Next buttons
		
		onItemSwitch:				function(){}, // Callback function when items are switches
	}
});

Once an element is initialized with the coverflow, you can call the jump method to move it left or right:

$('#flipster').flipster(); //initialize the carousel
$('#flipster').flipster('jump', 'left');

Flipster can build an unordered list of links to the slides, which can come in handy for some implementations. Include the id and title attribute on each item and set enableNav: true in the Javascript parameters.

An item list like:

<div class="flipster">
	<ul class="flip-items">
		<li id="Item-1" title="Item 1 Title">
			<img src="" alt="" />
		</li>
		<li id="Item-2" title="Item 2 Title">
			<img src="" />
		</li>
		...
  </ul>
</div>

will output:

<ul class="flipster-nav">
<li class="flip-nav-item no-category"><a href="#Item-1" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 1 Title</a></li>
<li class="flip-nav-item no-category"><a href="#Item-2" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 2 Title</a></li>...
</ul>

in the container.

The navigation list can also group items into categories. Include the data-flip-category along with the id and title attributes with enableNav: true in the Javascript parameters.

An item list like:

<div class="flipster">
	<ul class="flip-items">
		<li id="Item-1" title="Item 1 Title" data-flip-category="Category 1">
			<img src="" alt="" />
		</li>
		<li id="Item-2" title="Item 2 Title" data-flip-category="Category 1">
			<img src="" />
		</li>
		<li id="Item-3" title="Item 3 Title" data-flip-category="Category 2">
			<img src="" />
		</li>
		<li id="Item-4" title="Item 4 Title" data-flip-category="Category 2">
			<img src="" />
		</li>
		<li id="Item-5" title="Item 5 Title">
			<img src="" />
		</li>
  </ul>
</div>

will output:

<ul class="flipster-nav">
	<li class="flip-nav-category">
		<a href="#" class="flip-nav-category-link" data-flip-category="Category 1">Category 1</a>
		<ul class="flip-nav-items">
			<li class="flip-nav-item"><a href="#Item-1" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 1</a></li>
			<li class="flip-nav-item"><a href="#Item-2" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 2</a></li>
		</ul>
	</li>
	<li class="flip-nav-category">
		<a href="#" class="flip-nav-category-link" data-flip-category="Category 2">Category 2</a>
		<ul class="flip-nav-items">
			<li class="flip-nav-item"><a href="#Item-3" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 3</a></li>
			<li class="flip-nav-item"><a href="#Item-4" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 4</a></li>
		</ul>
	</li>
	<li class="flip-nav-item no-category">
		<a href="#Item-5" class="flip-nav-item-link">Item 5 Title</a>
	</li>
</ul>

in the container.

• Coverflow Style
• Carousel Style
• Better Demos
• Compatibility Testing (IE8/9...)
• Flat style
• Option for number of items to display while in Carousel view

If you can make this better, don't be shy! I'll be happy to merge pull requests as long as they keep the project lightweight, simple to set up and free of dependencies beyond jQuery.

Also, if you run into a problem or have an idea, feel free to make an issue on the github project and I'll get on it when I can!

Special thanks to @shshaw for major additions in version 0.3!

• 0.3.2 - February 4 2014

  • Added public access for jump method and functionality for exposing other methods. (Thanks @JoeWagner!)
  • A number of bug fixes.

• 0.3.1 - July 18 2013

  • Better demos ( See http://brokensquare.com/Code/jquery-flipster/demo/ )

• 0.3.0 - July 17 2013

  • @shshaw forked from @drien's jQuery.Flipster
  • Added new Carousel style! Shows 5 items at a time in a looping carousel
  • Added itemContainer, itemSelector, style, and start options for basic configuration
  • Added enableKeyboard, enableMousewheel, and enableTouch options to enable/disable features
  • Added enableNav and enableNavButtons options to insert controls into the container
  • Added onItemSwitch callback

• 0.2.1 - July 11 2013

  • Fixed bug where all keyboard input was being suppressed.

• 0.2.0 - June 27 2013

  • Added automatic height adjustment for the container element, which used to just overflow.
  • A few minor code improvements.
  • Added minified versions of the js and css files.

• 0.1.3 - March 25 2013

  • Strong men also cry, strong men also cry.

• 0.1.0 - March 25 2013

  • Improvements in fallbacks for old version of IE and basic fixes to make it actually work.

• 0.0.0 - March 22 2013

  • LIFE ON THE BLEEDING EDGE BABY

© 2013 Adrien Delessert

Licensed for use under the WTFPL. http://www.wtfpl.net/