Happy news! My book, Secrets of the JavaScript Ninja is finally in stock on Amazon! It’s been available on Manning.com for over a month now but I think Amazon has been struggling to keep the books consistently in stock.
You can get an ePub or Kindle version of the book at Manning.com.
I’ve written about the writing process for this book previously (and why it’s taken so long to get out). I especially want to thank my co-author Bear Bibeault who worked hard to get this book out the door.
One question that I’ve been asked recently: “How relevant is this book to writing JavaScript in 2012?” I think it’s still exceedingly relevant. This book has two major focuses:
- Teaching aspects of the JavaScript language that are under-served or poorly explained. (For example I’ve been getting a number of messages from people saying how much they appreciated the explanation of closures in the book and that it finally helped them to understand that feature of the language.)
- Helping people understand the internal workings of cross-browser DOM-centric JavaScript libraries (such as jQuery). Considering how popular jQuery is (64% of the top 10,000 web sites use jQuery) and, relatively, how few people truly understand what the library does or is trying to do – there is still a huge market for people to learn what exactly jQuery is and how it works.
I’m really happy that this book is finally out and to celebrate I’ve been trying to blog more (as you may have noticed). Are there any particular topics that you’d like me to write about? Let me know!
Alex (February 7, 2013 at 2:24 pm)
EUR 24,23 with shipping to EU ;)
Paul Bienick (February 7, 2013 at 3:06 pm)
So it costs less to kill a few trees and get the paperback on Amazon, but Amazon doesn’t offer the Kindle version – for that you have to go to manning.com and pay $6 more. I really don’t understand this world we live in sometimes.
I know this isn’t your fault, John, and I’m buying your book no matter what. Congrats on getting this done.
Grahame SD (February 7, 2013 at 4:45 pm)
Well done on getting the book out!
“Are there any particular topics that you’d like me to write about? Let me know!”
JavaScript is a great language, but the biggest pain I have with it is organizing it. In a language like C# or Java organization is built in, but with JS I have to do it myself. I use the module pattern a lot but I’ve shied away from adopting one of the dynamic loading libraries such as require.js because (IMHO) there isn’t a true standard and I don’t want to end up having to change all my code down the road when the industry finally adopts one. So I’ve just been keeping it as simple as possible so I can backfill later.
I’d really appreciate your take on this and where you see us going as regards a standard.
Thanks in anticipation :)
tarique (February 7, 2013 at 5:27 pm)
Is there a best practice for handling cross domain javascript communication??
Daniel (February 7, 2013 at 7:11 pm)
I’m interested in how to architecture single page web applications without using one of those heavy weight frameworks. By far the biggest problem I have in my job is the lack of proper examples on how to keep my single page web application organized while working around the DOM limitations and annoyances.
COTOHA (February 7, 2013 at 7:12 pm)
why is there a samurai on a cover instead of a ninja? :)
shawnXiao (February 7, 2013 at 9:20 pm)
Is there a Chinese version?This book is so great.
haliphax (February 8, 2013 at 8:45 am)
Awesome! I’ll definitely be picking up a copy come payday. I second COTOHA’s sentiment, though — that ain’t no ninja. ;)
Jon (February 8, 2013 at 5:16 pm)
Is it is or is it ain’t a ninja? Check out TIME’s article on John Man’s new Ninja book.
“And quite often the samurai during the day doubled as ninja during the night.”
Teylor Feliz (February 9, 2013 at 3:52 pm)
Congrats! It has been a long time since you announced the book. :)
Grahame SD (February 11, 2013 at 9:51 am)
I second Daniel’s “topics that you’d like me to write about”. That’s a great subject to help us all with.
Pedro (February 11, 2013 at 11:43 am)
“Are there any particular topics that you’d like me to write about? Let me know!”
Wish to know your opinion, if any, about rxjs.
Rob Levin (February 11, 2013 at 1:25 pm)
Whew, you got it out…yippie! Yeah, so I received my pre-ordered copy maybe a week ago. Loving this book so far (only 50 pages in). Nice work!
http://lyricstranslate.com/en/translator/karveenwasion (February 18, 2013 at 7:38 am)
Right now it appears like Drupal is the best blogging platform available
right now. (from what I’ve read) Is that what you are using on your blog?
irctc (February 20, 2013 at 1:48 pm)
yes! thats a great question asked above, why there is a samurai instead of ninja. But i would love to have a one for me!!!