在jQuery四周岁生日来临之际，jQuery团队发布了万众期待的jQuery 1.4。该版本最显著的特点就是最常用的jQuery方法的性能得到了显著的提升。
jQuery 1.4对很多常用的方法进行了改写。在分析代码基时，我们发现与之前的版本相比，新版的jQuery的性能得到了显著的提升；增加了很多内部函数调用以降低代码的复杂度
对于该新版本，jQuery团队付出了巨大的努力以改进测试覆盖率，同时提供了最广泛的浏览器支持，这也是jQuery最为人称道之处：
在jQuery 1.4中，我们修复了207个bug（而在1.3中修复的bug数为97个）；此外，还将jQuery 1.3.2中的1504个测试提高到了现在的3060个。现在，jQuery测试在所有主流浏览器（Safari 3.2、Safari 4、Firefox 2、Firefox 3、Firefox 3.5、IE 6、IE 7、IE 8、Opera 10.10以及Chrome）中全部通过。
官方的jQuery API文档也针对此次发布进行了彻底的重写，同时还发布了一个新的jQuery论坛：
在过去四年当中，我们使用邮件列表以及Google Group管理jQuery相关的讨论和社区，现在这种管理方式已经难以跟上时代的发展了。
为了庆祝jQuery四周岁生日，我们特别创建了jquery14.com站点：
我们为你带来了连续14天的新版本专题介绍，以此庆祝jQuery 1.4的发布。各位可能会注意到我们对数字14情有独钟，这是因为jQuery 1.4是在jQuery四周岁生日这一天发布的，而这天正好是1月14日。记得每天都过来看看，因为每天都有值得你期待的新内容！
可以从jQuery官网或是Google以及微软CDN上下载jQuery 1.4。Visual Studio开发者还要再等几天才能使用上与1.4版兼容的智能感知提示。
英语原文：
jQuery 1.4 Released with Improved Performance and New API Documentation and Support Forums
Posted by Dionysios G. Synodinos on Jan 24, 2010
In celebration of jQuery’s 4th birthday, the jQuery team has announced the release of the jQuery 1.4. This release features performance improvements in the most commonly used jQuery methods:
Many of the most popular and commonly used jQuery methods have seen a significant rewrite in jQuery 1.4. When analyzing the code base we found that we were able to make some significant performance gains by comparing jQuery against itself: Seeing how many internal function calls were being made and to work to reduce the complexity of the code base.
For the new release, the jQuery team has made a significant effort to improve the test coverage and support the widest possible range of browsers, something that jQuery is well known for:
In jQuery 1.4 we’ve fixed 207 bugs (compared to 97 bugs in the 1.3 release). Additionally we’ve increased our test coverage from 1504 tests in jQuery 1.3.2 to 3060 tests in jQuery 1.4. The jQuery test suite is 100% passing in all the major browsers (Safari 3.2, Safari 4, Firefox 2, Firefox 3, Firefox 3.5, IE 6, IE 7, IE 8, Opera 10.10, and Chrome).
The official jQuery API documentation has been completely rewritten for the new release and there has also been an announcement of a new jQuery Forum:
We’ve been using mailing lists, and subsequently Google Groups, over the past 4 years to manage the discussion and community around jQuery. That particular solution has simply not been able to scale to our discussion requirements both in terms of participation and in managing spam.
jquery14.com has also been created to celebrate its birthday:
We're excited to bring you fourteen consecutive days of new releases to celebrate the release of jQuery 1.4. You'll notice that we're excited about the number fourteen since jQuery 1.4 is being released on the birthday of jQuery (January 14th) . So be sure to come back each day as another announcement is made and new content is released!
jQuery is available both for downloading on your own server and from Google's or Microsoft's CDN. Visual Studio developers will have to wait a few more days for intellisense to be compatible with version 1.4.