I love the tl;dr section. It's basically what I have do when reading books, in order to recall the essential information without having to read the entire chapter again. Well played.
Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
61–70 of 113 posts
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#62this looks promising. I like how it teaches the concepts using plain Javascript without focusing on a tool or library. Kudos.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#63This is great!
I am fairly familiar with programming having done both AS, Lingo and PHP I understand code when I see it. I am however not a programmer but more a technically oriented product designer and so I don't get to practice as often.
I have been trying to get into javascript and while I understand all the fundamentals it's still not something that I feel comfortable doing which is a shame as it's kind of the language of the internet.
Skimming through this books it looks like the perfect way for me to spend my next two weeks of vacation so thank you so much.
Is there a way to to donate to you?
Having made something as comprehensive as this you need to think about how to break it up so that you keep users engaged and so that you cam maximise your revenue. Selling books is mostly a spike and then long slow ramp towards halt so make sure you keep your content alive.
If I may come with two suggestions.
1. Make a forum for your readers perhaps in the form of an online reading group so that you have someone to go through the book with.
2. Make a step by step email course where you go through the book and have people turn in assignments perhaps even in forums.
3. Let people hire you as a private teacher perhaps build up . a network of private teachers. (Ok that was three suggestions)
These I think would be great ways to monetize.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#64Hi all, author here. Backstory: I'm a CS engineer/teacher and this book is a side project started in December 2016. You can read a bit more about it here: https://medium.com/@bpesquet/walk-this-javascript-way-e9c45a... . The writing process is now completed and I'm actively looking for feedback to make the book better. Any opinion or advice about content, pricing, or that hastily created Leanpub cover would be greatl…
Nice. Thanks for sharing. Bravo for burrito recipe. I'm convinced I became a programmer in 4th grade. Our creative writing assignment was instructions for making a peanut butter & jelly sandwich. Then our teacher followed our instructions literally. Hilarity ensued. --- I think the Intro's link to the local env setup in the appendix is broken. Anymore, I always check the colophon first, then decide to proceed. I appl…
Re: nodeJS versions, I'd go with something like "Install NodeJS, this book was written with version x.y.z"; I don't think JS will become backwards incompatible in the near future, so as long as the book doesn't contain experimental or unofficial JS features, it should be fine for the next 5-10 years.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#65I just got home from teaching JavaScript to a room full of people who've never written a line of code in their life. This book is missing something critical that most intros to JavaScript overlook: How does the student set up the plumbing and run their code? It's amazing how much of a hump this is for many trying to get started. It also amazes me how oblivious most of us programmers are to it. "Just open Chrome Dev T…
NodeJS could do with offering a simple UI-based runtime, like a stripped version of Atom or VS Code, preconfigured to just run whatever's on screen.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can technically still use var if you wish, but I'm not sure of any reasons to do so. When switching to let/const, bear in mind the difference in scope: var is function-scoped: (function () { var x = 1; })(); var x === undefined let/const are block-scoped: if (true) { var x = 1; let y = 1; const z = 1; } x === 1 y === undefined z === undefined
The only reason I can think of is if you want hoisting for some reason. For example, if you want to call functions before they are declared. Personally, I don't like that style, but some people do.
let / const are both hoisted though, they're just hoisted to the top of the current block scope instead of function scope.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can technically still use var if you wish, but I'm not sure of any reasons to do so. When switching to let/const, bear in mind the difference in scope: var is function-scoped: (function () { var x = 1; })(); var x === undefined let/const are block-scoped: if (true) { var x = 1; let y = 1; const z = 1; } x === 1 y === undefined z === undefined
I find function lexical scope more natural for JavaScript which is very function orientated, where you pass functions around and use closures a lot. I also find it a PITA having to declare variables before the block, instead of where they are first used. Ex: if(..) { ... huge block of code .. var foo = 1; } Means I do not have to scroll back and forth to declare and set the variables at different places.
That's probably because you're a more experienced Javascript developer and happen to know about it - and have experienced the pitfalls already. Most people, including myself (and I'm a fairly experienced JS developer myself) find block scoping to make more sense. Less prone to bugs and whatnot too.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can technically still use var if you wish, but I'm not sure of any reasons to do so. When switching to let/const, bear in mind the difference in scope: var is function-scoped: (function () { var x = 1; })(); var x === undefined let/const are block-scoped: if (true) { var x = 1; let y = 1; const z = 1; } x === 1 y === undefined z === undefined
I find function lexical scope more natural for JavaScript which is very function orientated, where you pass functions around and use closures a lot. I also find it a PITA having to declare variables before the block, instead of where they are first used. Ex: if(..) { ... huge block of code .. var foo = 1; } Means I do not have to scroll back and forth to declare and set the variables at different places.
In strict mode JS runtimes will hoist the `var` declaration to the top of the declared scope anyway. So `foo` would be declared at the start of the containing function scope, regardless of where you appear to declare them.
Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#69Re: Show HN: The JavaScript Way, a book for learning modern JavaScript from scratch
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a great idea and I think the world does need a new book for pure JS. There was a book released about 10 years ago by the guy who wrote jQuery. It started with basic JS and went all the way through to advanced features. It really helped me master JS. Where I think that book is better then yours is that it focuses entirely on JS where as you spend a lot of time talking about http and the web works. Anyone reading…
I definitely wouldn't assume that a JS newbie knows the http fundamentals. That definitely wasn't the case for me when I started learning. You can get a lot done on the web without really understanding what you're doing.
Maybe but it makes this book only good for true newbies. There's plenty of tutorials for complete newbs but no good book for people who want to master modern pure JS