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Review
"ppk on JavaScript is a well-written and cleanly structured walk through useful JavaScript examples. It is extremely practical, and goes right to the core of what a web programmer needs to know about JavaScript to build real sites, right now.
In essence, it reminds me of how I learned to work on the web in the first place: careful examination of other people’s work. At its best, this book is a clearly annotated view source of Koch’s projects. It’s a comprehensive exploration of Koch’s thoughts about the problems he’s run into (problems that you’ll run into, too), how he approached them, and ultimately how he’s solved them." -- Mike West, Managing Editor, Digital Web Magazine
In essence, it reminds me of how I learned to work on the web in the first place: careful examination of other people’s work. At its best, this book is a clearly annotated view source of Koch’s projects. It’s a comprehensive exploration of Koch’s thoughts about the problems he’s run into (problems that you’ll run into, too), how he approached them, and ultimately how he’s solved them." -- Mike West, Managing Editor, Digital Web Magazine
Product Description
Whether you're an old-school scripter who needs to modernize your JavaScripting skills or a standards-aware Web developer who needs best practices and code examples, you'll welcome this guide from a JavaScript master.
Other JavaScript books use example scripts that have little bearing on real-world Web development and are useful only in the chapter at hand. In contrast, Peter-Paul Koch's book uses eight real-world scripts he created for real-world clients in order to earn real-world money. That means the scripts are guaranteed to do something useful (and sellable!) that enhances the usability of the page they're used on.
The book's example scripts include one that sorts a data table according to the user's search queries, a form validation script, a script that shows form fields only when the user needs them, a drop-down menu, and a data retrieval script that uses simple Ajax and shows the data in an animation.
After an overview of JavaScript's purpose, Peter-Paul provides theoretical chapters on the context (jobs for JavaScript, CSS vs. JavaScript), the browsers (debugging, the arcana of the browser string), and script preparation. Then follow practical chapters on Core, BOM, Events, DOM, CSS Modification, and Data Retrieval, all of which are explained through a combination of theoretical instruction and the taking apart of the relevant sections of the example scripts.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a fantastic practical javascript book. Its not for the absolute beginner. You should have a basic understanding of Javascript before attempting this book. However once you do you will not regret it and the book lives up to its authors promise of getting you up to intermediate javascript developer level. Five stars all the way for being such a practical useful book.
9 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I read this book hoping to learn a little bit of javascript for a website. It's a very comprehensive review, but for beginners it's probably too advanced to pick much up without reading from cover to cover.
I tend to like to try out some examples and get a feel for the basic of a language first, but this book doesn't take that approach - instead, it explains a lot of theory, and then gets you doing things towards the end.
Furthermore, the author makes reference to a set of example scripts which he wrote for various projects, but never actually gives the full scripts - instead, he looks at bits of each in every chapter. I found this very very confusing. One of the example scripts was to do dropdown menus, which was what I wanted to do, but the script was so split up over different chapters that I was unable to put it back together to try it out.
He also gives a number of deliberately wrong examples, to demonstrate how not to do things, but again I was confused by these, especially as some of them came before the corresponding correct example - I want things I can type in and play with, and then maybe some wrong examples at the end - but ultimately, I want to know how to do it, not how to not do it!
I think that if you read this book cover to cover, you'd probably come away as a bit of an expert, but if, like me, you like to dip in and out of computer books and try examples and get a feel for the language early on, then this is not the book for you.
In saying that, it is very comprehensive and covers a lot of ground, so for someone who already knew some javascript, it'd be a good reference guide.
I tend to like to try out some examples and get a feel for the basic of a language first, but this book doesn't take that approach - instead, it explains a lot of theory, and then gets you doing things towards the end.
Furthermore, the author makes reference to a set of example scripts which he wrote for various projects, but never actually gives the full scripts - instead, he looks at bits of each in every chapter. I found this very very confusing. One of the example scripts was to do dropdown menus, which was what I wanted to do, but the script was so split up over different chapters that I was unable to put it back together to try it out.
He also gives a number of deliberately wrong examples, to demonstrate how not to do things, but again I was confused by these, especially as some of them came before the corresponding correct example - I want things I can type in and play with, and then maybe some wrong examples at the end - but ultimately, I want to know how to do it, not how to not do it!
I think that if you read this book cover to cover, you'd probably come away as a bit of an expert, but if, like me, you like to dip in and out of computer books and try examples and get a feel for the language early on, then this is not the book for you.
In saying that, it is very comprehensive and covers a lot of ground, so for someone who already knew some javascript, it'd be a good reference guide.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
18 reviews
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
fills a void
30 Oct 2006
Format:Paperback
"ppk on JavaScript" fills an interesting void with the focus of today's JavaScript books. Most books either focus on "JavaScript in 21 Days", "JavaScript - Complete Reference" or "AJAX". This book covers techniques for creating clean and accessible JavaScript functionality.
The book's stated audience is someone who knows at least some JavaScript - a beginning level or up. Basically, you should feel comfortable reading and understanding code. I think the book might be a little overwhelming for a beginner to understand. A beginner could read it twice - once right away and once after reading another JavaScript book.
The author views JavaScript as a technique to add usability. He shows how to create "unobtrusive" JavaScript. In other words, the JavaScript stays out of the HTML page and the page works without JavaScript, albeit with less functionality.
Eight case studies (real life examples) are used throughout the book. The author points out why he selected certain techniques. He also notes bugs and where he would have done things differently. I particularly liked the emphasis on separation of concerns.
Keyboard users are also discussed from an accessibility point of view in several chapters. In other chapters, only users without JavaScript enabled were discussed. I would have liked a little more consistency with how accessibility was treated.
Overall, the book was very good. The tips were useful and I enjoyed the emphasis on design. And AJAX is discussed from the point of view of how it was used before it was called AJAX.
The book's stated audience is someone who knows at least some JavaScript - a beginning level or up. Basically, you should feel comfortable reading and understanding code. I think the book might be a little overwhelming for a beginner to understand. A beginner could read it twice - once right away and once after reading another JavaScript book.
The author views JavaScript as a technique to add usability. He shows how to create "unobtrusive" JavaScript. In other words, the JavaScript stays out of the HTML page and the page works without JavaScript, albeit with less functionality.
Eight case studies (real life examples) are used throughout the book. The author points out why he selected certain techniques. He also notes bugs and where he would have done things differently. I particularly liked the emphasis on separation of concerns.
Keyboard users are also discussed from an accessibility point of view in several chapters. In other chapters, only users without JavaScript enabled were discussed. I would have liked a little more consistency with how accessibility was treated.
Overall, the book was very good. The tips were useful and I enjoyed the emphasis on design. And AJAX is discussed from the point of view of how it was used before it was called AJAX.
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Great JavaScript book by PPK!
12 Oct 2006
Format:Paperback
It's funny, from looking at the title of the book, "PPK on JavaScript", you would never know it is one of the most interesting and informative JavaScript books on the market. PPK - Peter-Paul Koch is a well-known JavaScript and web developer from the Netherlands. His website [...] has pretty much been the defacto standard resource for all browser and JavaScript issues for the past few years. If there was something you wanted to know about JavaScript or some browser bug or issue you would go to his website or email him. He probably is not known unless you read some of the well-known development blog sites. He does not do public speaking at web conferences (unlike Jeremy Keith), but maybe after this book he will. And yes, most people it seems just call him PPK, not Peter so I guess that is one of the reason of the book title.
Anyways, on to the book review...Since I have most of the latest JavaScript books that have been published the past year, I was hoping this would be a little different, which it was. The skill level for this book is probably leaning towards the intermediate side since many of the code-snippets that PPK talks about use DOM syntax. Though that is not to say that if you're a beginner you shouldn't buy this book, but you will need to fast-forward to the middle of the book (Chapter 5), which he gives a great background of the Core concepts of the JavaScript language.
So basically the book is split into 3 sections (or how I see them separated). The first 4 chapters goes into high-level topics that are great for the basic DOM scripting who knows the basics of using the DOM but needs more instruction with usability, accessibility, standards and how the different layers (structure, content and presentation) work. These 4 chapters are the best in my opinion because most of these topics would require you to search endless articles on the web to find them. Apart from a few pages in the 5th edition of JavaScript: The Definitive Guide, I have not seen this in any other book. Chapter 5: The Core; covers all basics of the language to get anybody up to speed or use as a reference. The rest of the book covers topics such as the BOM (Browser Object Model), Events, DOM (Document Object Model), and CSS modification. The included source examples are the real gem of the book since it is real JavaScript applications that were used in real clients, not just little code examples that cannot be used in the real environment.
So if you need another JavaScript book and not sure what to get, or you have bought Jeremy Keith's excellent book (DOM Scripting: Web Design with JavaScript) and want to learn more about the DOM and accessibility or you are a newbie and want to learn the latest JavaScript standards and practices from a real developer, then this is the book for you. Go out and get it now!
Anyways, on to the book review...Since I have most of the latest JavaScript books that have been published the past year, I was hoping this would be a little different, which it was. The skill level for this book is probably leaning towards the intermediate side since many of the code-snippets that PPK talks about use DOM syntax. Though that is not to say that if you're a beginner you shouldn't buy this book, but you will need to fast-forward to the middle of the book (Chapter 5), which he gives a great background of the Core concepts of the JavaScript language.
So basically the book is split into 3 sections (or how I see them separated). The first 4 chapters goes into high-level topics that are great for the basic DOM scripting who knows the basics of using the DOM but needs more instruction with usability, accessibility, standards and how the different layers (structure, content and presentation) work. These 4 chapters are the best in my opinion because most of these topics would require you to search endless articles on the web to find them. Apart from a few pages in the 5th edition of JavaScript: The Definitive Guide, I have not seen this in any other book. Chapter 5: The Core; covers all basics of the language to get anybody up to speed or use as a reference. The rest of the book covers topics such as the BOM (Browser Object Model), Events, DOM (Document Object Model), and CSS modification. The included source examples are the real gem of the book since it is real JavaScript applications that were used in real clients, not just little code examples that cannot be used in the real environment.
So if you need another JavaScript book and not sure what to get, or you have bought Jeremy Keith's excellent book (DOM Scripting: Web Design with JavaScript) and want to learn more about the DOM and accessibility or you are a newbie and want to learn the latest JavaScript standards and practices from a real developer, then this is the book for you. Go out and get it now!
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Not a beginner's book
26 Mar 2008
Format:Paperback
I bought this book because I was familiar with the author and his website, quirksmode. I figured this guy was a master of JavaScript and a book written from him would be a solid resource to learn from.
Well, I was half-right. Early on in the book he presents a script and says that you should know what it does before reading his book. Well, I knew what it was, but it's not the truth. This book is all about technique and execution. He shows innovative and great ways to implement code, but you have to know how to write javascript first. If you're not an experienced programmer or are unfamiliar with javascript, you may want to consider this book...after you've gotten a proven beginner's manual and gone through that first. Head First Javascript or Javascript in 21 days are good examples.
Well, I was half-right. Early on in the book he presents a script and says that you should know what it does before reading his book. Well, I knew what it was, but it's not the truth. This book is all about technique and execution. He shows innovative and great ways to implement code, but you have to know how to write javascript first. If you're not an experienced programmer or are unfamiliar with javascript, you may want to consider this book...after you've gotten a proven beginner's manual and gone through that first. Head First Javascript or Javascript in 21 days are good examples.
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