ecmanaut: 2006-05-17

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New edition of Javascript: the Definitive Guide

Good news! David Flanagan recently announced the fifth edition of his book Javascript: the Definitive Guide, something I've been eagerly awaiting for a year or two now, being the only book about the language to date that I have found worth buying. Amazon is accepting pre-orders already, and it seems it will be shipping by early August.

The first part of the book deals with the core language, as described by the ecmascript standard. Personally, I am most of all looking forward to the second part, which focuses on client side applications of javascript -- my own primary interest in the language. David's teaser promises chapters in contexts of SVG, the <canvas> tag, XML processing and scripting HTTP and Flash. If they are even close to the very high standards of the previous (fourth) edition from 2001, it will be an excellent read and all-round reference work to have at hand.

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2 Comment:

Do you know if there's too a part about the news web-development's approach, as AJAX?

By Anonymous, on Wed May 17, 02:09:00 PM CEST
There is (the "XML processing and scripting HTTP" bit, and you might have noticed David's pained comment about it being web2.0 ready), but I'm assuming there will be very little talk of that whole hype, public madness and trendy frameworks bit, and much more to the point hard facts and on the mark data on what works how, where.

If you look for books specifically on AJAX, there is a chance you might be better off with something trendy with that in its title (the crop, by now, should afford you several options), but if you want to learn, understand, use and work effectively with the language itself (as opposed to copying bits and pieces from tutorials, blog posts and the like and maybe get something that works, under favourable conditions), JSDG is the way to go.

I'd still recommend getting the real thing even if you end up picking some other book to get proficient with AJAX particulars in theory and practice, which might be more about the interplay between server and client ends, which I would assume is a bit beyond the scope of this book.

By Johan Sundström, on Thu May 18, 09:25:00 AM CEST