JavaScript: The Definitive Guide [ILLUSTRATED] (Paperback)

by David Flanagan (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Since the earliest days of Internet scripting, Web developers have considered JavaScript: The Definitive Guide an essential resource. David Flanagan's approach, which combines tutorials and examples with easy-to-use syntax guides and object references, suits the typical programmer's requirements nicely. The brand-new fourth edition of Flanagan's "Rhino Book" includes coverage of JavaScript 1.5, JScript 5.5, ECMAScript 3, and the Document Object Model (DOM) Level 2 standard from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Interestingly, the author has shifted away from specifying--as he did in earlier editions--what browsers support each bit of the language. Rather than say Netscape 3.0 supports the Image object while Internet Explorer 3.0 does not, he specifies that JavaScript 1.1 and JScript 3.0 support Image. More usefully, he specifies the contents of independent standards like ECMAScript, which encourages scripters to write applications for these standards and browser vendors to support them. As Flanagan says, JavaScript and its related subjects are very complex in their pure forms. It's impossible to keep track of the differences among half a dozen vendors' generally similar implementations. Nonetheless, a lot of examples make reference to specific browsers' capabilities.

Though he does not cover server-side APIs, Flanagan has chosen to separate coverage of core JavaScript (all the keywords, general syntax, and utility objects like Array) from coverage of client-side JavaScript (which includes objects, like History and Event, that have to do with Web browsers and users' interactions with them. This approach makes this book useful to people using JavaScript for applications other than Web pages. By the way, the other classic JavaScript text--Danny Goodman's JavaScript Bible--isn't as current as this book, but it's still a fantastic (and perhaps somewhat more novice-friendly) guide to the JavaScript language and its capabilities. --David Wall

Topics covered: The JavaScript language (version 1.0 through version 1.5) and its relatives, JScript and ECMAScript, as well as the W3C DOM standards they're often used to manipulate. Tutorial sections show how to program in JavaScript, while reference sections summarize syntax and options while providing copious code examples.

From Library Journal
O'Reilly books have a reputation among programmers for providing some of the best technical information for professionals. No exception, these three web-related books will only enhance O'Reilly's reputation. JavaScript is not Java, but it is very useful because JavaScript code does not need to be compiled and the scripts can be embedded directly into an HTML document. Flanagan's work is an excellent book for programmers interested in learning it quickly. Grand, meanwhile, provides an exceptionally clear discussion of Java itself that is particularly useful for a working programmer moving from C++ to Java. Threads are what makes Java a particularly useful language for multiprocessing?the ability to appear to do more than one thing at a time?which is what the Internet is all about. The tricky part of threads is that the concept is new for most users. Oaks offers a very clear discussion of how to spawn a process, when to spawn, and how to synchronize and schedule it, all illustrated with good network examples.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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