Learning JavaScript: A Hands-On Guide to the Fundamentals of Modern JavaScript

by Tim Wright

Get Started Fast with Modern JavaScript Web Development! With the arrival of HTML5, jQuery, and Ajax, JavaScript web development skills are more valuable than ever! This complete, hands-on JavaScript tutorial covers everything you need to know now. Using line-by-line code walkthroughs and end-of-chapter exercises, top web developer and speaker Tim Wright will help you get results fast, even if you’ve never written a line of JavaScript before. Smart, friendly, enthusiastic, and packed with modern examples, Learning JavaScript covers both design-level and development-level JavaScript. You’ll find expert knowledge and best practices for everything from jQuery and interface design to code organization and front-end templating. Wright’s focused coverage includes regular break points and clear reviews that make modern JavaScript easier to learn—and easier to use! Learning JavaScript is your fastest route to success with JavaScript—whether you’re entirely new to the language or you need to sharpen and upgrade skills you first learned a decade ago! Coverage includes • Mastering all of the JavaScript concepts and terminology you need to write new programs or efficiently modify existing code • Creating robust, secure code for both the design and development levels • Maximizing usability, reusability, accessibility, clarity, security, and performance • Taking full advantage of the browser environments your code will run in • Accessing the DOM to create behaviors and data interactions • Storing data for easy and efficient access • Using variables, functions, loops, and other core language features • Interacting with users through events • Communicating with servers through Ajax • Improving your productivity with JavaScript libraries

Genres: Computer Science

350 pages, Paperback

First published July 25, 2012

Reviews

[Chinmoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is definitely one of the best books on JavaScript. It not only provides the core features of JavaScript, it also gives you the new features ofHTML5 API. More importantly it is a guide for designers and/or devolopers describing the essentials of progressive enhancements. It not only introduces the advanced features of JavaScript but it goes beyond of how to use them skillfully so as to boast the performance. The books clearly explains when to use CSS and when not to use JavaScript libraries.
Excellent book for a beginner.

[Daniel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very very basic. There was a lot of text that didn't need to be there. It was as if the author had 100 pages of information and tried to bulk it up to 300 with filler. I hate fillers.

[Valentin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tim Wright's book presents in a unique, easy read way, the fundamentals and the concepts behind JavaScript. The author does a great job of presenting the language without being to overwhelming with information and I think this makes it a very useful book for anyone who wants to learn JavaScript or to get to know the fundamentals better.

The book provides useful information about the concepts of JavaScript and how this language should be used in relation to HTML & CSS and goes from the basic things like accessing the DOM, understanding how variables, functions and loops work, to more advanced concepts like JSON and HTML5 JavaScript APIs. It also looks into some of the most used JavaScript libraries and presents the advantages and disadvantages of using them. The book presents code examples along the way which makes the content easier to follow and understand. However I didn't find all the code examples particular useful and some readers might feel that the book lacks some more in depth info about some of the fundamentals presented.

I like the writing style of the author and I will definitely look for other books written by him. I think "Learning JavaScript: A Hands-On Guide to the Fundamentals of Modern JavaScript" is a great book not only for beginners who are starting to learn the language but it's also useful for anyone who wants to better understand some of the concepts behind the language. If you are interested in JavaScript this is a book you should not skip. I enjoyed reading it and I would recommend it to anyone interested in the subject.

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

My feelings on the book are very mixed. There are some really great aspects to it and some pretty awful ones, but audience here is important. If you have a larger programming background, the very short code samples with little explanation and additional details might be fine. They are just enough to get the point across and let you explore more on your own using other documentation to find you way. If on the other hand you have little experience programming or little experience learning this way, you are likely to be frustrated with the examples.

There is a lot of reading that isn't directly how to code so much as how to code better. Initially I thought this a great addition to a learn JavaScript book, but after using the book in a class of first time JavaScript students, they just aren't ready to grasp all of that at once. They couldn't focus well on these better practices while really just wanting to make something work.

[Mariyan Tashev · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is a good resource for a beginner.
It's practical and the examples are well presented.
It isn't dry and boring, which is something i like a lot in a technical book.

That said, the author stresses a lot on some topics like "progressive enhancement" and goes a bit overboard. It's very front-end focused (kinda obvious) and you need to have html/css understanding to fully engage with the examples. There are two chapters "Code Organization" and "Making JavaScript Easier with Libraries" which divert from the terse and well constructed form of the book and are a bit too general and wordy.

Overall it's a good read and I can definitely say that i have learned from it.

[Dave Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're like me and don't remember the last project in which you coded outside of jQuery, this is a great reminder of the original language syntax. If you're new to development, this is an excellent primer on both JavaScript and some of the core components of programming. There's also good summaries of some newer implementations of the language, such a HTML5 APIs and the concept of server-side JavaScript. This is a good resource to have in your development library,

[Timothy Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

What started as an excellent book on JavaScript, ended as a really impractical beginner guide. The Book is by no means boring and I appreciated the author's sense of humor, but the example were so different from the real world programming I felt I wasn't learning anything.

[Alison McDonald · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think this will be more useful once I've read a more in-depth JS book and then go back to this one.

[Justin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Too basic for me and too all over the place and lacking for an introduction to programming. Really this book doesn't have a place.

[David VanderWyst · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book was easy to read, covered a lot of ground. I'll not only go through it again, but likely hang onto it for quite a while as a reference to some things.