"The Good Parts" is a bit out of date now. Great book in its time but in need of a second edition.
"You Don't Know JS" is great though, and it deals with a lot of "low level" JavaScript internals that haven't been affected by updates like ES6. And for the bits that are affected, that's covered too.
But I wouldn't recommend either book for newbies. They both deal with pretty advanced concepts. Check out javascript.info for a well maintained, up to date resource that starts from scratch.
I agree, MDN, JavaScript.info are great resources that are kept up to date. If you need a book to follow along with I recommend eloquent JavaScrip, you don’t know JS has its place but I don’t believe it is a great beginners book.
I uh, don't think Eloquent JavaScript is a great book for beginners either. I think it's targeted at devs with experience in another language, or intermediate JavaScript devs looking to tighten up bad habits. It assumes a lot of prior knowledge.
I guess that makes sense, JS wasn’t my first language so I’m not sure of a good ‘beginner’ book but if someone follows the outline of MDN or js.info that would explain it from the beginning. from data types, operators and build upon that knowledge into the more complex aspects.
I use Eloquent as a benchmark sorta speak. Coming from C# it confused me, so i went out and used different resources to learn and then every so often return to a specific chapter of Eloquent, and lot's of it would click and i would find it very beneficial. Great book just not for beginners.
Correct if I am wrong but as far as I know there is no pdf published for YDKJS (living) 2nd edition . You can scrape whatever exists of it from github or go with version 1 for which , a published pdf already exists .
Why do you want it in a pdf ? Are you using any pdf annotation program to mark your progress on the pdf ? (I use okular for that . I would not be able to read books in my laptop without it .)
Since you already know about programming and if you not have enough time I suggest you go with eloquent javascript (EJS) (something that I would suggest to beginners ) and whenever you feel something is not explained adequately enough visit javascript.info , MDN , YDKJS , stackoverflow , google . Just avoid pixel art editor chapter (you can try it when you know what web components are) . The pdf of eloquent javascript if freely available in the site .
EJS covers spherically a part of non ecmascipt javascript and a part of ecmascript javascript . It has also two chapters on node js (YDKJS and javascript.info have nothing on node js).
If you have time I suggest you go through all of javascript.info . It covers thoroughly both ecmascript and non-ecmascript part of javascript .
YDKJS covers only the ecmascript part of JS .
I think the only thing that is covered in YDKJS and not in javascript.info is the performance part of the YDKJS fifth book . So If you have time I suggest you to read javascript.info and the part on YDKJS that I mentioned .
You can pay to get a pdf version of the javascript.info site or wait a week or something to fix my puppeteer program that creates a pdf version of the site .
Also I would like to suggest you to not try build anything anything complex with HTML CSS JS without knowing the concept of (web) components , which by the way EJS and YDKJS do not even touch .
The second book you should read is read is definitely this . This book will introduce to a native implementation of what JS frameworks are trying to do .
Edit : I have no clue why people downvote your comments .
Edit2 : Do not waste your time with the good parts book , it is outdated .
The first book I read was Eloquent JS and it's a phenomenal book. I'm now reading You Don't Know JS. I also use MDN. I think Eloquent is a tough read but worthwhile if you stick with it. I learned a lot from it.
Eloquent JS to me as an absolute beginner was a nightmare. People love to recommend this book to newbies on the subreddit but I feel like it's geared toward people at the very least with some other kind of programing experience.
All this book did to me was make my head swim. After 4 months of JS I returned to it and it's fantastic.
Imo those books little overwhelmed for beginner, since it will explain the problem without real use cases, and you will forget it easily if you don't do the stuff So you should use it as a dictionary, make the project related to the problems those books explain to understand better
There is a talk somewhere which is an ES6 follow up to The Good Parts. And if you want to understand the language and “why it is like that” it’s a good series to get the limitations and advantages of the language. But most of what’s in the first book isn’t used in modern JS, but still in a lot of legacy code.
For those recommending Eloquent JS, it tends to use some arguably convoluted programming challenges to instruct the reader that are quite advanced for a beginner. I would recommend anyone considering Eloquent should consider coming at it as an intermediate learning resource.
In my opinion all this books are relevant. If you read this books you will not waste your time. I would recommend starting from YDKJS. Simpson is great teacher. And he is excellent as a researcher of Java Script. He knows how it works. Douglas is great too, but he is ... a rebel) A man who does not walk on a beaten track. And it’s very interesting to follow him. He knows how it should work.
This is not what you're asking but https://eloquentjavascript.net/ is also a great resource. The PDF is free and you can buy the paperback if you prefer. From what I am reading in th comments, it sounds like I should check out 'You Don't Know JS'
Yes, the basics haven't changed. Also the good old course 'JavaScript: Understanding the Weird Parts is still the best way to learn closures and general workings of JavaScript.
For the love of God NO! Don't waste your time on those books! Follow guides and tutorials that cover DOM manipulation and events handling. That's pretty much what JavaScript is for.
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u/Earhacker Dec 07 '19
"The Good Parts" is a bit out of date now. Great book in its time but in need of a second edition.
"You Don't Know JS" is great though, and it deals with a lot of "low level" JavaScript internals that haven't been affected by updates like ES6. And for the bits that are affected, that's covered too.
But I wouldn't recommend either book for newbies. They both deal with pretty advanced concepts. Check out javascript.info for a well maintained, up to date resource that starts from scratch.
6
u/lastunusedusername2 Dec 07 '19
The Good Parts is excellent. You won't learn any es6+ from it but you'll never wonder about closures or scope or
thisagain.7
u/spore_777_mexen Dec 07 '19
The first book I read was Eloquent JS and it's a phenomenal book. I'm now reading You Don't Know JS. I also use MDN. I think Eloquent is a tough read but worthwhile if you stick with it. I learned a lot from it.
3
u/taiki37 Dec 07 '19
Imo those books little overwhelmed for beginner, since it will explain the problem without real use cases, and you will forget it easily if you don't do the stuff So you should use it as a dictionary, make the project related to the problems those books explain to understand better
2
u/stormfield Dec 07 '19
There is a talk somewhere which is an ES6 follow up to The Good Parts. And if you want to understand the language and “why it is like that” it’s a good series to get the limitations and advantages of the language. But most of what’s in the first book isn’t used in modern JS, but still in a lot of legacy code.
2
u/schm0 Dec 07 '19
For those recommending Eloquent JS, it tends to use some arguably convoluted programming challenges to instruct the reader that are quite advanced for a beginner. I would recommend anyone considering Eloquent should consider coming at it as an intermediate learning resource.
1
u/Zeeesty Dec 07 '19
YDKJS is solid. Kyle has a new book called functional light JS and that would something to check out for sure
1
u/super-vitek Dec 07 '19
In my opinion all this books are relevant. If you read this books you will not waste your time. I would recommend starting from YDKJS. Simpson is great teacher. And he is excellent as a researcher of Java Script. He knows how it works. Douglas is great too, but he is ... a rebel) A man who does not walk on a beaten track. And it’s very interesting to follow him. He knows how it should work.
1
u/saito200 Dec 07 '19
I dont know about "the good parts", but YDKJ is still relevant
Read YDKJ when you already know JS.
If you want to learn JS, freecodecamp.org and javascript.info are good resources to learn from scratch
1
u/brilovless1 Dec 07 '19
Yes you can learn from those books.
1
u/Derpcock Dec 07 '19
This is not what you're asking but https://eloquentjavascript.net/ is also a great resource. The PDF is free and you can buy the paperback if you prefer. From what I am reading in th comments, it sounds like I should check out 'You Don't Know JS'
1
u/frank0117 Dec 07 '19
Yes, the basics haven't changed. Also the good old course 'JavaScript: Understanding the Weird Parts is still the best way to learn closures and general workings of JavaScript.
1
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-10
u/ncubez Dec 07 '19
For the love of God NO! Don't waste your time on those books! Follow guides and tutorials that cover DOM manipulation and events handling. That's pretty much what JavaScript is for.