JavaScript and jQuery: Interactive Front-End Web Development 1st Edition

Summary first: This book presumes some knowledge of HTML & CSS (look up Duckett' preceding book if necessary), and introduces main elements of Javascript adequate for basic web-design projects, with no claims to comprehensiveness, and it's certainly a success in that respect.PRESENTATION: Impressive. Looks more like a Wired issue than your typical introductory programming/scripting book, as the latter usually try to fit as much information as possible into limited space, which makes pragmatic sense, but makes you not want to pick up the book and proceed. This book uses space liberally, sacrificing limited space (~600 pages + index) for readability ( devoting an entire page to the diagram of a for loop for instance), using very large fonts for summaries, etc.The design is elegant, and also well-thought: Different text colors, italics etc, are fully employed to make newly introduced syntax easier to comprehend. All code sinppets are included in blue boxes clearly separated from the text, where necessary, javascript and html codes are presented side-by-side. For every method / syntax introduced, browser compatibility is given in a table, and more compatible alternatives offered when necessry.SCOPE: As a corollary of the presentation approach, the scope is limited, albeit sensibly. The book aims to present JavaScript to the extent that it can be employed in basic web design, without trying to present the language in its entire functionality, as such important concepts/aspects are left out (Regular expressions, for instance). Also, HTML and CSS are NOT covered in the book(they're covered in Duckett's preceding book "HTML and CSS", prequel to this one), JQuery, Ajax & JSON are covered in a total of 150 pages, providing a decent, sensible introduction only.COMPARISON/SUGGESTIONS: If you want a more comprehensive guide at hand, consider getting Flanagan's "Javascript: The Definitive Guide", or an equivalent. If you want a more compelling and detailed approach to the language, supplement this book with "Eloquent Javascript", a book available, free of charge, online.ONLINE SUPPLEMENTATION: True to its claim, all code presented in the book are available online for bulk-download.Table of Content (CHAPTERS): 1 The ABC of Programming / 2 Basic JS Instructions / 3 Functions, Methods, Objects / 4 Decisions & Loops / 5 DOM / 6 Events / 7 JQuery / 8 Ajax & JSON / 9 APIs / 10 Error Handling & Debugging / 11 Content Panels / 12 Filtering, Searching & Sorting / 13 Form Enhancement & Validation / IndexDURABILITY (WHENCE THE MISSING STAR DERIVES): I've read the entire book on the same bookholder & desk very gently, and still ended up with every page detached from the spine. (For comparison, other books I've read with the same method look almost unused). It's sad to see such a horrible spine/binding chosen for a book when so much care has obviously gone into its composition and design. Hope they revise the spine in future editions.

I suppose I got lucky and received a book that wasn't badly built. If you're not sure what I'm talking about, read the other reviews. I'm on the 2nd to last chapter and the book has held up just fine. Contrary to what others have mentioned, I only found 1 significant error in the book that caused sample code not to work. Not a big issue.I read Duckett's other book "HTML & CSS" and had hoped this book would have a similar format. I was not disappointed. The book is loaded with visuals, diagrams, and you have access to the code used in every example.The book also goes a step further by introducing you to JSON, AJAX, Regex, and using and creating jQuery plugins. I wasn't expecting to be introduced to all this extra material, but I am glad I was. I've heard the terms JSON and AJAX before, but could not really figure out what they meant. The book helped to make these topics clear. I've also known about jQuery plugins, but never knew how to actually use them. The book shows you exactly how to do that.My advice to anybody going through this book: go through each of the examples he provides, typing out the code exactly as it appears in the book. Do your best to understand Duckett's logic. Afterwards, delete it and re-create the script on your own and try not to look at his sample code for help. You'll find yourself flipping through older sections of the book a lot to reference methods you'll need to use. You'll also find yourself doing a lot of google searches to be reminded of the methods that are available in jQuery. You'll also find yourself "stuck", wondering why your code isn't working. Then you'll have an "ah ha" moment and adjust your code. When you are done, you'll notice your code might look different than Duckett's. That's okay: no two people code the same. By doing this, it will take much longer to complete the book, but you will have more Javascript experience than somebody who read the book and followed the examples, but never stepped out on their own to really test their knowledge.This is another book by Duckett that is well worth the money. My only disappointment is that he didn't write a book that covers XML and its related languages. I read a book on it and much of it went over my head, meaning I now must find a second XML book and read it, hoping that the second perspective fills in any gaps.

Very informativeVery detailedVery articulateVery impressedI enjoyed this book more than I was supposed to it helped me understand Javascript and jquery on a much higher level now