Originally posted on 10/10/08 at http://likesalmon.wordpress.com
I struggled with this, as the usual method of including a javascript library and an external javascript script did not work. Usually, I would do this:
<script style="text/javascript" src=<?php bloginfo('url'); ?>/wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery.js" ></style>
<script style="text/javascript" src=<?php bloginfo('template_directory'); ?>/myScript.js" ></style>
But that didn’t work at all, even when I included the jQuery.noConflict() line in my script. So I ended up going with this, which loads the jQuery library that is included with the wordpress installation and then loads my script without any conflicts:
<?php wp_enqueue_script( 'myScript', '/wp-content/themes/myTheme/myScript.js', array('jquery') ); ?>
The wordpress docs have very little to say about wp_enqueue_script(), the function that makes this possible. A good resource with examples of use can be found here:
http://nickohrn.com/loading-javascript-libraries-in-wordpress-plugins-with-wp_enqueue_script/