Customer Reviews

Javascript Interactive Course

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

 

 

If a book could recieve 0 stars, this would be that book. The book is full of errors. Some of the code doesn't even function that way its supposed to. Get the JavaScript Bible. It is a much better book for beginners to JavaScript, and very much accurate.

I'm a sysad and code in a different language every day. I have a library of about 150 books. I normally go with ORA for my computer books. This time I thought it would be cool to do an interactive course. This book is 90% flush... garbage. It lack depth, explaination and style. The authors don't convey an air of knowledge. The mailing list that one can subcribe, never contains comments other then those of people angery at the publisher, who publically acknowledged many, many errors in the book (!). Skip this one and get something else... after this experience I still haven't started Javascripting. Looking at others comments it looks like Netscape's book is the best. This makes sense because it is in all reality a language that Netscape made.

I returned this book after finding the web-based learning center via the Waite Group is closed. The Waite Group no longer exits. You will be sent to SAMS for online learning.

As the saying goes: "Nothing is completely useless - it can always serve as a bad example." Or in this case, it can also be burned for warmth.

If you're already a programmer, you might want to flip through this book just to convince yourself that you, too, can make a living writing computer books. If you're a beginner, I do not suggest you look at this book at all - it takes some experience to appreciate a book as bad as this.

By the time I write this, the book is quite outdated (covers JavaScript 1.0, version 1.5 is the current); that is NOT the reason for my low rating. I decided to still write this, just in case there is a new version of this and people want to see the history of this author / publisher. Here are my thoughts:
Positive:
- decent (not excellent) beginer book
...
Negatives:
- lousy reference book
- approximately half the book is useless, meaning off topic: one chapter is spent on Java, another is spent on Navigator Gold (I would have not appreciated this even when Navigator Gold was actually a useful tool)
...
- partial coverage of certain important subjects (operator precedence, bitwise operators)
- way too much fluf (he spends one chapter on the history, keep in mind this is the days of JavaScript 1.0!!!)

Look through this at the library, and then have a look at a real JS book...

I bought this particular book because it featured a link to the website for interactive testing and I could read the entire text online. This eliminated the need to have the text on hand at work, which facilitated me completing the course during my lunchtimes and break times. This feature alone made it worth half its price to me. I did note some errors, but I don't find that too surprising with computer books these days in this price range. I was able to spot the coding errors once I ran the script and the debugging dialog boxes displayed. In some ways that challenged me to better examine what was going on and learn from it. It's an easy reading book, and gave a fair overview of where JavaScript fits in. As a reference book, however, it is difficult to zero in on exactly what you're looking for. Once I started programming JavaScript, I found I needed a language reference, indexed, with table of contents. The CD-ROM included with the text helps in that it contains the code for all the examples in the book, but nothing more. I did not take advantage of the CEU option, but I did download and print the completion certificate.

This book does have some decent information, but it is impossible to find. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to the structure of the book other than it starts with some useful information and continues on to less useful. There is little to no information about form validation, libraries or style. The few useful functions in this book are more easily found in a Real Reference book like the Javascript Bible

I started learning JS from three books, found this one with more clarity and precise explanations. Recommended for people who want to learn js in minimum time.

This was my first book on Javascript, and I must say that it has enabled me to now include javascript into several of my latest projects. If you're looking for a great javascript resource this is it, and the online examples and tests are great

I am a beginner of Javascript and this is the first book that I've bought for this subject. Actually, I feel that the structure or format of the book is quite good. After following the first few Chapters, I have begin to understand more about Javascript and to do some simple programs as well. Of course we can't just rely on a book in order to become a good programmer. I have tried some of the examples and samples and it work well as it should. The Interactive Course is still new but I think it is a good way to learn especially when the on-line help is given