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Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

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Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#1

Post by qwerty456127 »

I feel like I would like to learn modern JavaScript (as supported by the most recent version of V8) from the very basic to the perfect and complete level (which makes the whole point of the question, ways to mediocre proficiency are countless and obvious).

I believe this is possible (and maybe not even hard) as I only mean the language itself - no browser APIs, no frameworks/libraries/tooling, no patterns and practices beyond those necessary to understand the features and the quirks of the language itself, what they can be used for and how to deal with them correctly.

Where do I go and how hard is this actually going to be?

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#4

Post by r_singh »

My favourite resource that I discovered a few years ago in a similar Ask HN thread: http://eloquentjavascript.net

> Where do I go?

You don't really need to go anywhere else (especially not into the vortex of looking for the best resource) to learn and be confident with vanilla javascript.

> ... and how hard is this actually going to be?

Well that depends more on you and your preference for learning materials. I studied a chapter a day (like 3 hours concentrated per day) and was done in 3 weeks.

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#5

Post by d--b »

It depends on how much programming you already know.

If you don’t know any programming, it’s a bad idea to start by JavaScript. Its design has followed a path from a hackish webpage scripting language to being used server-side, so a lot has evolved and a lot of crap remains from the old days. If you don’t know programming, you’ll have a hard time discerning the newer, cleaner features from the older less polished ones.

In my opinion it’s easier to learn java or C or Kotlin, which are a lot neater. And then learn about how JavaScript differs.

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#6

Post by disiplus »

i think i haven't understand javascript till i have read "JavaScript: The Good Parts"

now that book is old and es6 changed a lot of things, so find a good book read it and if it has examples go thru them. only with examples was i able to understand scope inheritence and asynchronous calls in javascipt. like if you call settimeout in loop and all other gotchas.

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#7

Post by IvanK_net »

It is not clear, if you want to learn programming, or you alerady know it, and want to learn a new language.

It takes years to become good at programming. Once you know programming, it usually takes hours to learn a new (procedural) programming language.

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#8

Post by dutchCourage »

To me, the nice part of JS is that you can get pretty far without knowing the language intricately. So you can actually get started and be somewhat productive while picking up more knowledge along the way. The front-end ecosystem is so broad that it's hard to focus only on vanilla JS anyway.

That said, if you want a comprehensive read about Javascript, there's You don't know JS: https://github.com/getify/You-Dont-Know-JS

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#9

Post by tiborsaas »

Start here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoSksQ4s_hg&list=PL4cUxeGkcC...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWOYAxlnaww&list=PL4cUxeGkcC...

I'd also use various materials, like books or courses online.

Finally, start a small project in JS, best way to apply your knowledge and discover gaps.

Re: Ask HN: How do I learn JavaScript?

#10

Post by rasikjain »

r_singh wrote: post #4

My favourite resource that I discovered a few years ago in a similar Ask HN thread: http://eloquentjavascript.net > Where do I go? You don't really need to go anywhere else (especially not into the vortex of looking for the best resource) to learn and be confident with vanilla javascript. > ... and how hard is this actually going to be? Well that depends more on you and your preference for learning materials. I studi…

Agree with op, the above link https://eloquentjavascript.net is a good resource to checkout.

I have bookmarked few other links from HN

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13979472

https://github.com/getify/You-Dont-Know-JS

https://www.robinwieruch.de/javascript-fundamentals-react-re...

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