Customer Reviews

JavaScript Sourcebook: Create Interactive JavaScript Programs for the World Wide Web

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book would have been nice to keep on my bookshelf. But, at the very beginning I could see the inconsistencies of the programming examples. It drove me mad. So, I had to return it.

The author has done a good book for beginners. If you are confused reading the first chapters, try reading from the middle of the book first! Then you will understand expressions, variables, and more programming basics.

This is the first and only book I've read on JavaScript. Though I have some programming experience I knew little about object oriented programming. I thought the explaination was good and the book in well organized - chapters on objects, properties, methods and functions, etc. My complaint is this: there is some confusing stuff here. Programming elements are used in examples before they are explained. Though some of this is necessary, he could have used simpler examples in many places. Also, he used different ways to call functions in the examples. For example, to call a function from a mouse event, he used no arguments one time and used arguments in another example. Both ways work, but it confused me. It is a pretty good reference book. Following the table of contents most instructions are listed alphabetically with page numbers. The explainations are in sections with the program elements in easy to spot bold type.

The reader can really get a basic understanding of JavaScripting however, very few of the examples in the book nor the CD ROM are functional. Being a JavaScript novice I did not appreciate the hours I spent correcting technical mistakes in the book and the CD that would prohibit most script examples from working. I look forward to a free copy of the second revision. With working scripts I would have given the book a 9

This book has many pages and examples but, sadly, very few are complete with details. Author uses a subjective style which, and he says it is his intent, that provides few/no comments on coding of intricate details of a highly technical subject. Few screen displays are given of the outcome of gobs of incomplete code. I am still searching for a very good JavaScript reference and know that the Official Netscape JavaScript Book only rated a 4. Newsgroup says JavaScript Bible by D. Goodman is a 9 but can not locate it. Euphemisms of "secret sauce" and "know the secret", egads. This book had great spurts but needed additional inputs.

The source code has lots of bugs, and generally uses mediocre software engineering practices.

The provided CD examples (when zipped) would fit on a 1.44 floppy, so don't get your hopes up that there are lots of examples.

This book offers detailed descriptions of JavaScript commands, and can also be used as a reference guide by programmers. You are able to learn about object-oriented programming.

I have been using McComb's *JavaScript Sourcebook* (1996) for nearly a year to teach myself JavaScript and develop scripts for my professional use (internet based university teaching). I have consulted other books (e.g., Reaz Hoque, *Practical Java Script Programming* (1997)) and extensively mined online JavaScript websites, including the online version of *Complete Idiots Guide to JavaScript* and Netscape's online Reference. Without doubt, McComb's is the most comprehensive, most clearly written, and most practical book (and his website is also useful). His exposition of how JavaScript programming language is structured is a clear tutorial enabling rapid grasp of the essentials. His explanation of methods, functions, variables, events, and other elements of JavaScript scripting is a model of clear exposition. After having spent several years coping with Perl to build interactive teaching programs, McComb's book stands tall as an example of how to write for the intermediate as well as beginning programmer; it has made JavaScript a surprisingly easy substitute for even complicated cgi and Perl programs. Without his book, I could not have adapted some of the cut-and-paste scripts that are available in various JavaScript WWW archives. McComb's practical scripts discussed in the book are especially valuable. I have been able quickly to adapt his password and database scripts to my own use. I fail to understand where the critics of this book who have written negative reviews for this Amazon page are coming from. Their criticisms are without foundation

I thought this book was too vague and too inconsistent. Beyond this the book didn't cover the advanced issues I needed to learn. Lucky for me I found a great JavaScript reference in a rather unlikely place, William Stanek's Netscape ONE Developers Guide, which covers JavaScript 1.2, server-side JavaScript (LiveWire), plug-in programming and much more in great detail. Try THAT book...You won't be disappointed. Gre