What does the Backbone.js extend function do?

Question

I understand it is providing static or "class" properties, but I want to understand how it's doing this, is it creating a new object and putting these static properties on the prototype?

Backbone.View.extend(properties, [classProperties])

Answer 1

Backbone used and internal helper function called inherits. You can see the annotated source code here. It sets up the prototype chain to provide class-like functionality.