JavaScript: The Good Parts: The Good Parts: Crockford, Douglas: 9780143429036: Amazon.com: Books

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Most programming languages contain good and bad parts, but JavaScript has more than its share of the bad, having been developed and released in a hurry before it could be refined. This authoritative book scrapes away these bad features to reveal a subset of JavaScript that's more reliable, readable, and maintainable than the language as a whole—a subset you can use to create truly extensible and efficient code.

Considered the JavaScript expert by many people in the development community, author Douglas Crockford identifies the abundance of good ideas that make JavaScript an outstanding object-oriented programming language-ideas such as functions, loose typing, dynamic objects, and an expressive object literal notation. Unfortunately, these good ideas are mixed in with bad and downright awful ideas, like a programming model based on global variables.

When Java applets failed, JavaScript became the language of the Web by default, making its popularity almost completely independent of its qualities as a programming language. In JavaScript: The Good Parts, Crockford finally digs through the steaming pile of good intentions and blunders to give you a detailed look at all the genuinely elegant parts of JavaScript, including:

Syntax
Objects
Functions
Inheritance
Arrays
Regular expressions
Methods
Style
Beautiful features

The real beauty? As you move ahead with the subset of JavaScript that this book presents, you'll also sidestep the need to unlearn all the bad parts. Of course, if you want to find out more about the bad parts and how to use them badly, simply consult any other JavaScript book.

With JavaScript: The Good Parts, you'll discover a beautiful, elegant, lightweight and highly expressive language that lets you create effective code, whether you're managing object libraries or just trying to get Ajax to run fast. If you develop sites or applications for the Web, this book is an absolute must.

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From the Preface

This is a book about the JavaScript programming language. It is intended for programmers who, by happenstance or curiosity, are venturing into JavaScript for the first time. It is also intended for programmers who have been working with JavaScript at a novice level and are now ready for a more sophisticated relationship with the language. JavaScript is a surprisingly powerful language. Its presents some challenges, but being a small language, it is easily mastered.

My goal here is to help you to learn to think in JavaScript. I will show you the components of the language and start you on the process of discovering the ways those components can be put together. This is not a reference book. It is not exhaustive about the language and its quirks. It doesn't contain everything you'll ever need to know. That stuff you can easily find online. Instead, this book just contains the things that are really important.

This is not a book for beginners. Someday I hope to write a JavaScript: The First Parts book, but this is not that book. This is not a book about Ajax or web programming. The focus is exclusively on JavaScript, which is just one of the languages the web developer must master.

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About the Author

Douglas Crockford is a Senior JavaScript Architect at Yahoo!, well known for introducing and maintaining the JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) format. He's a regular speaker at conferences on advanced JavaScript topics, and serves on the ECMAScript committee.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0596517742
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Yahoo Press
Publication date ‏ : ‎ June 3, 2008
Edition ‏ : ‎ 1st
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 172 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0764363778
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0143429036
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 8.6 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7 x 0.38 x 9.19 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #336,852 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #55 in JavaScript Programming (Books)
- #323 in Software Development (Books)
- #400 in Internet & Telecommunications

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Douglas Crockford

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Douglas Crockford is the author of How JavaScript Works. He has been called a JavaScript Guru, but he is more of a Mahatma. He was born in Frostbite Falls, Minnesota, but left when he was only six months old because it was just too damn cold. He has worked in learning systems, small business systems, office automation, games, interactive music, multimedia, location-based entertainment, social systems, and programming languages. He is the inventor of Tilton, the ugliest programming language that was not specifically designed to be an ugly programming language. He is best known for having discovered that there are good parts in JavaScript. That was the first important discovery of the Twenty First Century. He also discovered the JSON Data Interchange Format, the world’s most loved data format.

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Customers find the book concise and effective, providing a fantastic overview of JavaScript syntax and outlining good programming practice. They appreciate its straightforward organization, dense content, and elegant design. While some customers consider it a good price, others feel it's overpriced for a limited reference. Customers note that the content is a bit dated.

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Readability Javascript knowledge Ease of learning Quality parts Density Design Value for money Dated content

322 customers mention "Readability"252 positive70 negative

Customers find the book readable and concise, providing a fantastic overview of JavaScript syntax.

"...programming experience that wants to know the best way to create and use objects, arrays, types, etc...." Read more

"...This book is NOT for beginners to programming. This book is very opinionated on what the core language constructs are and how to use them and..." Read more

"...While not strictly a replacement for XML, JSON is as readable, requires no external parser to implement and can be operated on directly in any..." Read more

"First of all this book is very good for what it is; describing the genesis of the Javascript language, why things work the way they do, and how to..." Read more

199 customers mention "Javascript knowledge"142 positive57 negative

Customers praise the book for outlining good programming practices and providing useful insights into JavaScript, making it a must-read for developers.

"...This book is aimed at someone with intermediate programming experience that wants to know the best way to create and use objects, arrays, types, etc...." Read more

"...It is more a meta-JavaScript guide of style, pointing out features and usage not available elsewhere, except perhaps at his website, "Douglas..." Read more

"...I feel definitely more energized to write prototype based Javascript and learn some Ajax libraries without being afraid to peak in at their source..." Read more

"...It is NOT a book on web programming. It will NOT teach you anything about HTML, or the DOM, or how to put little fiddlly-bits on the screen, or how..." Read more

31 customers mention "Ease of learning"31 positive0 negative

Customers find the book straightforward and easy to follow, with one customer noting it contains key techniques for programming in JavaScript.

"...It is a book on the constructs of Javascript, plain and simple...." Read more

"...I started learning JavaScript and found it easy to get started with. The online tutorials do a good job of exposing the syntax and basic concepts...." Read more

"...Crockford's writing is personable and clear, and the book's organization is straightforward. Here's my chapter-by-chapter breakdown...." Read more

"...These were a bit cryptic at first, but easy to decipher after some study...." Read more

11 customers mention "Quality parts"11 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate that the book focuses on using only the good parts of JavaScript.

"This book has some good parts, even some great parts...." Read more

"...JavaScript: The Good Parts" is really about the good parts, for the most of it, and best suited for a reader with a firm background in object-..." Read more

"...It's also the best way to write plain vanilla javascript: using only the good parts...." Read more

"...is that it teaches you, that JavaScript has many patterns and many components, and learning all of them at once is not necessary...." Read more

8 customers mention "Density"8 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the density of the book, with one noting it is very granular.

"...If that has no meaning for you, skip this item. Like K & R, it's thin but gets dense quickly. This is for a serious developer...." Read more

"...The book is pretty short, but it's also dense...." Read more

"This book is, as other reviewers have said, very dense with functional and technical concepts...." Read more

"...Despite its dense and compact content, it is well worth the read. It may be required to go through it more than once to fully grasp the concepts...." Read more

6 customers mention "Design"6 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the design of the book, describing it as elegant.

"...this book will definitely help you to understand the logic of its strange design. Everything in JavaScript (be it a string, array, number, etc.)..." Read more

"...The Kindle version looks great, everything is readable. The chapters and sections are light and terse, you get a lot of bang for your buck...." Read more

"...The author claims that under the festering pile of chaos there is a beautiful and elegant language: the good parts...." Read more

"...how powerful and flexible code can be written so as to be simple and elegant, using "good" JavaScript...." Read more

8 customers mention "Value for money"3 positive5 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the book's value for money, with some finding it reasonably priced while others consider it overpriced for a limited reference.

"...; this feels like stuff I'd just google while coding, not terribly valuable to me personally...." Read more

"...I don't regret my purchase as it was not expensive on Kindle, but I think this book needs an update." Read more

"...diagrams to illustrate each syntax, which adds thickness but little value to the book, then repeats them in Appendix D to add another 10 pages of..." Read more

"Good quality and good price with free shipping" Read more

6 customers mention "Dated content"0 positive6 negative

Customers find the book's content somewhat outdated.

"This book is so out of date that you can probably get a better deal on it at a thrift store...." Read more

"...opinions and ego that felt out of place and strict, and is pretty out of date (understandable, but it's too bad it was never updated)...." Read more

"Genuinely getting a bit outdated, but reading it was kind of an effective exercise in an odd way.. I still reread random sections and pick up things..." Read more

"A must read for any JS developer. Even though the code is a bit outdated with the recent EcmaScript updates, the information within is still relevant." Read more

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Frodo Baggins
Wish I had this book when I first started Javascript
Reviewed in the United States on June 27, 2008
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Do you struggle when creating objects in Javascript?
Do you find the syntax to be non-intuitive and frustrating?
Do you know the difference between using a function as an object vs using an object literal?
Do you know how using object literals can simplify your code and create something similar to namespaces?
Do you know how to augment the type system -- for example, if wanted all strings to have a trim() method?
Do you know why the "new" statement is so dangerous? Do you know an alternative that eliminates the use of "new" entirely?

These are some of the topics that the book touches upon.

This book is aimed at someone with intermediate programming experience that wants to know the best way to create and use objects, arrays, types, etc. Crockford takes his experience with Javascript to show you best practices coding techniques and styles to use with Javascript. In addition, the book provides insights into what makes Javascript so confusing and what can be done about it.

You might ask "Isn't this stuff already covered in other books that I have?" The answer is no. For one, most other books use a psuedo-classical coding style (see below) to explain objects that is a source of confusion.

Javascript can be very confusing, especially for programmers who have extensive experience in other C-based languages (like myself). Writing good Javascript that uses objects, methods, etc. is hard. In Javascript, if you want to create objects, use inheritance and create methods, you have several different ways to write your code and it's difficult to know what the strengths and weaknesses of each are.

Crockford explains the problem plainly. Other C-based languages use class inheritance (Crockford calls this classical inheritance). Javascript, on the other hand, is the only popular language that uses prototype inheritance, which does not have classes. However, the syntax which Javascript uses to create object is Java-like (Crockford calls this pseudo-classical syntax). It's confusing, because it keeps you in a class-based frame of mind while working in a language that has no concept of classes.

Clarifying what's going on with the object model is the best part of this book. Crockford also explains other parts of Javascript that can be problematic and the techniques that he prefers for handling them. I don't necessarily agree with all of them, but the important thing is that he explains his reasoning.

To effectively learn Javascript, I recommend that you buy 1) a book that covers the details of the language and can be used as a reference (e.g. Javascript, the Definitive Guide) and 2) Crockford's book. Advanced programmers might also enjoy Pro Javascript Design Patterns, which shows a number of ways to combine Javascript with some of the GoF patterns. I would avoid any cookbook style books on Javascript, because you're better off using YUI, JQuery or one of the other Javascript libraries than writing your own drag-and-drops, calendars, etc.

There are a series of Yahoo! videos by Crockford that mirror the material in this book and can be found as podcasts under YUI Theater. They contain nearly all of the material in the book and probably a little more. Those videos are:

- Douglas Crockford/An Inconvenient API: The Theory of the DOM (3 parts)
- Douglas Crockford/The JavaScript Programming Language (4 parts)
- Douglas Crockford/Advanced JavaScript (3 parts)
- Douglas Crockford/Javascript The Good Parts

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Jeff & Wendy S
Excellent book - for the right audience
Reviewed in the United States on October 2, 2012
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
I just finished this book. It's relatively short but you have to invest a lot of hours to properly absorb it. I think I'm going to need one more pass.

I do not understand the majority of complaints. Some compare Crockford to "the most boring professor you ever had", others said the information was poorly organized and not written very well. Others complained about his ego getting in the way. I, for one, found it to be very interesting and useful. Parts of it were a struggle to get through (and I've been a C coder for 20+ years) but mental challenges are a software engineer's specialty.

In my opinion, none of the complaints are completely true, assuming you are the right audience. This book is NOT for beginners. If you are relatively new to Javascript, it will definitely be useful, but if you are new to programming entirely, this book is not for you. This is a more academic book that gives you a peek behind the scenes to the inner workings of the Javascript language. It is more comparable to K&R's book for C Programmers, but not as complete (just the "good" and "awful" parts!).

It is a book about the Javascript LANGUAGE. It is NOT a book on web programming. It will NOT teach you anything about HTML, or the DOM, or how to put little fiddlly-bits on the screen, or how to work out game physics, or how to use any HTML-specific components. It is a book on the constructs of Javascript, plain and simple. It should NEVER be the only book on Javascript you would own, but if you are serious about Javascript, it should definitely be in your library. I don't think you can be a Javascript master without this book.

My minor grievances are mostly limited to subjective areas where I disagree with him:

1) He states his opinion absolutely, more so in the first part of the book. I prefer a less forceful approach that presents the arguments and lets you decide for yourself. However, I do not feel he went overboard in this regard as some did - I suspect they didn't get very far into the book.
2) While I completely understand the Javascript bugaboo that makes a case for mis-aligned curly braces (K&R style). I cannot get myself to follow this convention (except in a few areas where I make exceptions) To me, code is SO much easier to follow when all blocks are aligned. I will heed his advice and avoid the lurking JS bug, but I will not fully convert to misaligned braces. I resent that his JSLint tool generates hundreds of errors in my code because of this - but fortunately, there's an option to turn it off.
3) When he digs into some of the JS-specific patterns that aren't familiar to non-JS programmers, I wish he would add a disclaimer along the lines of "while this is a powerful tool, understand that depending on such patterns may make the code more difficult to maintain by others less trained in the specifics of Javascript. Or at least comment vigorously." I am a firm believer in "clarity over cleverness" in shared code.
4) In some of the trickier subjects, a few more examples would makes things easier to comprehend. I've never really used Regular Expressions before, and the chapter left my head swimming, and I felt the explanation of the various components of the expressions could have been better.

But these are not major grievances, and I whole-heartily recommend this book for the intermediate Javascript user or the novice JS user who has a solid background in general programming language constructs.

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Franz
Ezzes vom Javascript-Guru
Reviewed in Germany on February 12, 2010
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Ein rundum gelungenes Werk von Javascript-Guru, das trotz seiner schlanken Gestalt für viele Stunden Lesevergnügen sorgte.

In den wenigen Seiten ist soviel Wissen destilliert und in minimalistische Code-Beispiele gegossen, dass man jedes Kapitel gerne nochmals liest, um auch ja alles "mitzunehmen".

Javascript: The Good parts beginnt mit der Geschichte von Javascript und seinem Aufstieg von einer Verlegenheitslösung zur vielleicht wichtigsten Skriptsprache der Welt. Doch dann ist die Schonfrist vorbei: schonungslos zerpflückt Crockford die ohnehin spärliche Javascript-"Standardbibliothek" bzw. Syntax und erklärt anschaulich, warum ==, typeof und Co besser nicht mehr verwendet werden sollten. Auch die missglückte prototype/class-Inheritance von Javascript bekommt ihr Fett ab.

Aus den wenigen Resten, den good parts, zaubert Crockford aber erstaunliches: er erläutert, wie sich Klassen, Vererbung, Module oder funktionale Programmierung mit einfachsten Mitteln in Javascript emulieren lassen. Sehr gut finde ich, dass er den Bereich der DOM-Manipulation komplett außen vor läßt. Als hochperformante Programmiersprache hat sich Javascript längst von den typischen Rollover-Skriptchen emanzipiert, die in anderen Werken noch den Blick aufs Wesentliche verstellen.

Insgesamt eine sehr empfehlenswerte Lektüre für den fortgeschrittenen Javascript-Entwickler.

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A Reader
JavaScript the language, presented for professional programmers
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 3, 2009
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
In this small and dense book you will find JavaScript guru Douglas Crockford's presentation of the beautiful subset of a language that lies within JavaScript as a whole. You can use this subset to write serious programs. Occasionally you might have to use some of what Crockford calls "the bad parts", but at least you'll know the dangers, and how to mitigate them.

Perhaps more importantly, Crockford is very, very aware of how JavaScript differs from classical OO languages, and how these differences can and do trip up classically trained programmers, coming from (say) C++, C# or Java backgrounds. Crockford goes out of his way to point out the differences and the new way of thinking that is required for JavaScript.

This book is not necessarily going to be an easy read, even for professionals. Crockford says so himself in the preface. It's dense and terse. By necessity it introduces terms that might be confusing at first, and which are only explained later. You have to read the whole book, patiently waiting for certain concepts to be explained, and for things to fall into place. On a re-read it all begins to make real sense. I do recommend that this book is read at least twice, preferrably three times. At least it's short!

There is not much to do with the web in this book. There's no DOM manipulation examples, and no Ajax calls. You will find no discussion of modern JavaScript libraries. Crockford just focusses on his area of expertise: the JavaScript language. He highlights and promotes the good parts, and in appendices talks about the "Awful" and merely "Bad" parts.

This is an important book. Crockford writes with the authority, seriousness and simplicity of K&R. To be a modern web developer you really need to know what you're doing with respect to JavaScript. Look to other books to discuss JavaScript libraries, the DOM, animation effects and Ajax. Look to this book for the starting point to all that: the JavaScript language itself, weird and wonderful, familiar yet strange, bad parts and (fortunately) good parts.

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Jeff
Classic, Invaluable.
Reviewed in Canada on April 18, 2016
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
I would not forgive myself if I did not write a review for this book. This is one of the best books I have ever read in my entire life. It does not only help me grasp and love Javascript, but also greatly improved my understanding the way of how to do better programming. As a programmer, if you have not read this book, you missed a very good part. So, if you want to learn Javascript, this is definitely the right book to read.

Like the author said, This book is small, but it is dense. It is very hard to understand some pages in the first read. I read every pages at least 3 times, some pages more than 10 times to get the idea fully. But the effort definitely got rewarded.

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Jared Jonathan Ortega Ponce
Super interesante.
Reviewed in Mexico on August 21, 2023
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
Es un libro donde cada capitulo tiene algo que puedes aplicar en tu trabajo de todos los días. Esta lleno de buenos consejos o cosas que muchas veces se pasan por alto. Me encanto.

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Matteo Ambrosi
Ottimo per principianti ed esperti
Reviewed in Italy on June 30, 2016
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
Il libro è scritto veramente molto bene, i consigli forniti possono essere molto utili sia per uno sviluppatore principiante che per esperti. L'inglese utilizzato è abbastanza semplice e risulta di facile comprensione anche per chi non conosce la lingua in modo approfondito. Il metodo espositivo è molto concentrato, non ci sono tanti giri di parole o discorsi lunghi per aumentare il numero di pagine del libro, si tratta di un concentrato di informazioni molto utile anche da tenere a fianco del pc nel lavoro di tutti i giorni. Consigliato!

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Cannot learn JavaScript from this book

Top reviews from the United States

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5.0 out of 5 stars Wish I had this book when I first started Javascript

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book - for the right audience

Top reviews from other countries

5.0 out of 5 stars Ezzes vom Javascript-Guru

5.0 out of 5 stars JavaScript the language, presented for professional programmers

5.0 out of 5 stars Classic, Invaluable.

5.0 out of 5 stars Super interesante.

5.0 out of 5 stars Ottimo per principianti ed esperti

Wish I had this book when I first started Javascript

Excellent book - for the right audience

Ezzes vom Javascript-Guru

JavaScript the language, presented for professional programmers

Classic, Invaluable.

Super interesante.

Ottimo per principianti ed esperti