Is there CSS sprites support in jQuery UI

There are some good jquery-tool demos you can copy and then modify. They have good practices. I would start with the tab anchor demo, their stylesheet is well written.

@Mark: The tabs demo uses one image

Depending on the specific tasks you want to accomplish, which you do not specify in the OP, you might no need a plugin at all.

A possible way to use sprites with jQuery is to create a separate class for each sprite state, and then use jQuery to change the class attribute of the element showing the sprite with .attr():

  // Change the sprite state of an element
$(elementSelector).attr("class", spriteClassOfChoie);

For example here is a super simple image gallery making use of sprites and jQuery:

jsFiddle example

Script:

$(function() {

      // The sprite classes
    var sprites = ["home", "next", "prev"];

      // Which image is showing
    var showing = 0;

      // Show the first image
    $("#gallery").addClass(sprites[showing]);

      // Add a click handler to change sprite states
    $("input").click(function() { 

          // Cycle through images by making use of sprites
        $("#gallery").attr("class", sprites[(++showing % sprites.length)]);
    });
});​

HTML:

<input type="button" value="Show Next Image" />
<br/><br/>
<div id="gallery"></div>

CSS:

.home {
width:46px;
height:44px;
background:url('https://i.sstatic.net/vPDBk.gif') 0 0; }

.next {
width:43px;
height:44px;
background:url('https://i.sstatic.net/vPDBk.gif') -47px 0; }

.prev {
width:43px;
height:44px;
background:url('https://i.sstatic.net/vPDBk.gif') -91px 0; }

Why not do it all in CSS? A la:

btn
{
width:50px;
height:50px;
background:url(images/btnspite.png) -30px 100px;
}
btn:hover
{
background-position:-30px -150px;
}
btn:active
{
background-position:-30px -200px;
}

This'll get you started on actually implementing it: http://css-tricks.com/css-sprites/