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Announcement: Learn JavaScript Properly - Summer Session [Week 0]

69 points · submitted Jun 2013 by u/d0gsbody

There was a lot of demand for another session, so this is it. Put on your business socks, everyone.

Administrative Notes:

  • Later today, an omnibus post will go up in the sidebar that will link to all posts relevant to the current study group. Just go there whenever you are looking for stuff related to the current Learn JS Properly study group.

  • This group will last 7 weeks.

  • This study group is based on this track at JavaScriptIsSexy.com. This is a new session for the group the author mentions in that post.

  • I encourage you to use the IRC chatroom (linked in the sidebar) at #learnjavascript. I plan to hang out in there at least a few hours each week during this session.

  • New posts announcing that week's assignments will go up every Monday (sorry this one is not going up on a Monday).

  • Feel free to post your questions in this subreddit. There are a lot of people who know a lot of JS hanging around here.

Getting Ready for Week 1 ("Assignments"):

(1) Go browse through the JavaScriptIsSexy link posted above.

(2) Acquire a copy of either of the two following books:

(3) Sign up for an accounts on Stack Overflow.

(4) Sign up for an account on Codecademy.

(5) Watch Discover DevTools. This is important!

Bonus assignment before Monday - NOT required: Read Chapters 1-4 of Eloquent JavaScript.

EDIT: Link to the Omnibus post, if you want to save it for convenience.

58 comments · 97% upvoted · other discussions

comments

songho 8 points · Jun 2013

Found out about the first one halfway through and was never able to catch up. Thank you for giving me another opportunity!

hallbd16 5 points · Jun 2013

Ditto here, hoping to have more detailed discussions this time through and put on the teacher hat to force myself for deeper understanding. For those of you who are curious, JusTrill and I were both blogging about round one: JusTrill's Blog! and my Blog

Edit: Fixed the link. Sorry about that

JusTrill 3 points · Jun 2013

Thanks for the plug, and I'll be following along this time through again and hopefully can add to some constructive feedback.

My only advice to everyone planning on participating is to write as much code as you can! You can always go back to the readings and when you actually start writing code things will start coming together!

d0gsbody [OP] 2 points · Jun 2013

Those blogs are awesome.

songho 1 points · Jun 2013

Your blog isn't working for me.

efraglebagga 2 points · Jun 2013

he is missing a colon after http, try this

M0nsterRain 5 points · Jun 2013

Do you mind giving a quick rundown in the differences between the books?

For example, I don't have much WebDev experience but I have a lot of programming experience. Which one would be better suited for me?

JusTrill 1 points · Jun 2013

I did this study group last time around and used 'Professional Javascript for Web Developers' By Nicholas Zakas and was pleased. I had little web dev experience and some programming experience. Nothing was too dense or hard to grasp and it explained things well. I would personally recommend it but I didn't read any of the other book.

Good luck and make sure to contribute to the discussion each week. It really helps to collaborate with other people on the assignments.

Cheers!

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

Get the Professional JS one.

M0nsterRain 1 points · Jun 2013

I picked up the Professional one and it seems to move at a pace that is well suited for my knowledge level. I don't need an in depth explanation of what a function does, I just need to know how JS handles them, etc... This book is great for that.

I did notice that it seems to have less "type this into your IDE and run it" type of examples than most WROX books so I'm not sure how I feel about that. I'm definitely more of a learn by doing type of guy and examples like that help.

[deleted] 5 points · Jun 2013

This is great! I was swamped with school stuff last time.

d0gsbody [OP] 3 points · Jun 2013

Really happy to do it again!

mlloyd 3 points · Jun 2013

I'm in, was upset that I missed the first one.

Drehmini 2 points · Jun 2013

Thanks for the previous track and this new one! I'll definitely be participating!

EDIT: I also found the book here http://it-ebooks.info/book/416/

But I'm not sure if it's legit, if it isn't please let me know and I'll remove it!

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

Who cares. I'll put it up and leave it up unless the mods or a DMCA takedown notice instructs otherwise.

Thanks!

Drehmini 1 points · Jun 2013

I also meant to ask a question : Will there be a specific schedule for each week's post (for example: posts will be made on Monday)?

d0gsbody [OP] 3 points · Jun 2013

1 post per Monday for the next 7 Mondays.

[deleted] 2 points · Jun 2013

Sweet, perfect timing as I started on my own a few days ago.

Hypnotix 2 points · Jun 2013

I'm starting a skype group for this session which hopefully the mod will join also, who wants to join send a pm with your skype name so i can add you. All important questions will still be asked on this reddit btw.

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

I use skype for business a lot, but I will make another special skype name for this and send it to you.

TheBadger412 1 points · Jun 2013

Hi I would like to join the skype ground please

Hypnotix 1 points · Jun 2013

tell me your skype username then :)

udiWertheimer 2 points · Jun 2013

Sweet! I was planning on doing the old one "offline" and I'm just in the middle of the first week, so this is a great timing!

One question - I actually heard great things about both the "Definitive Javascript" book and "Professional Javascript for Web Developers", with some folks recommending reading both (not related to this group or the original JavaScriptIsSexy blog post).

Assuming I'm a fast learner and could handle the pace, and really willing to put in the effort to get "the whole picture", would you say it's valuable to try reading them BOTH along with the group instead of just one, or just a complete waste of time?

d0gsbody [OP] 3 points · Jun 2013

I think you'd probably just be better off reading one and then looking for blog posts/stack overflow questions on stuff you have more questions about.

hallbd16 2 points · Jun 2013

You can try to read both, but I am not sure even a fast learner and quick reader will have time for both. Remember so much value comes from the trial and error of writing the code yourself. For that reason, I would choose one (maybe skim the second for things you think are particularly important)

[deleted] 2 points · Jun 2013

So after 6 months of working on JavaScript frameworks (using all sorts of patterns), I've decided this isn't exactly the course for me. Even though i was a begginer i had someone to help guide me and now i know a good amount. But the 'intermediate and advanced' track on JS looks like my speed. Ill be doing that one on my own but maybe you can post a short summary of the topics covered week by week on this track? Im reading the book on the first week of the advanced track right now and the first chapters are kinda a drag, rehashing stuff I know already like implicit coercion, semicolon insertion, the global namespace and why its bad, etc. I just dont want to have any fundamental gaps in my knowledge so I wanna keep an eye on this as well. Which is why i was tempted to do it at first but im definitely past it i think. Let me know what I could do

hallbd16 1 points · Jun 2013

Look at the omnibus to see what we cover, then look at the book chapters to see if you are missing anything there. omnibus post from the 1st session

solilanel 2 points · Jun 2013

Just bumped on Javascriptissexy blog that recommends to join this group. I have all the materials to start. So, let enjoy the 7 weeks journey to JS mastery.

[deleted] 1 points · Jun 2013

I started working through the last session about a week ago on my own. I only made it through the 2nd week though, so I am excited to join in on this with the rest of you. Are you going to let us know when you will be on the IRC channel in advance, or will it just be when you randomly have time?

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

Randomly was my plan. I am not a JS guru or anything, but I'd be happy to try and work through problems with people.

Hypnotix 1 points · Jun 2013

Sweet, was hoping a new study group was made since i saw i missed the previous one. I have a suggestion thou, how about we make a skype group also for this one, i found it extremely useful in the past for study groups mainly because of the message history and call conferences.

codeXplorer 1 points · Jun 2013

I can't get the :hover to work. I'm selecting the ul id="events" element, then in the CSS panel, I check the :hover checkbox. In the video, it appears that the text-decoration:underline gets added as a result of checking this checkbox, not so in my browser. Nothing happens. I don't want to add the underline to the ul#events CSS rule, just the :hover on that element. However, I have to manually code the :hover rule. I've watched the video twice, anybody had this problem?

JusTrill 1 points · Jun 2013

I had issues with this one as well the first time around. You have to create a new css rule add the :hover pseudo code to the event class... so:

.event:hover { text-decoration: underline; }

Then go to the the Run 5k event and force the hover event.

Hope that helps!

codeXplorer 1 points · Jun 2013

In lesson 2, "Inspect the "Run 5K" event, find its ".event" CSS declaration, and link from there to the corresponding location in the stylesheet."

How do you "link from there to..." I've clicked the link to the stylesheet after inspecting the events class for Run 5K list item, but that is not "linking" to the stylesheet, that only "opens" the stylesheet. I'm not a noob to DevTools in Chrome, but I was interested to see these different features. However, something is wrong here. Anybody having this issue?

markphd 1 points · Jun 2013

When you inspect the element, just click the .css styleheet, it will open the "Sources" tab and it will load the stylesheet. If you installed the extension, remember to relaunch Chrome. It happened to me also.

TheBadger412 1 points · Jun 2013

I am totally confused.. the link to the stylesheet is a link to some random file..

https://d1740rtcumxhiu.cloudfront.net/assets/calendar/calendar-b6bc5ef67922a8c7f26a807341c08d8c.css

this opens a plain text file in the browser, nothing opens in sources.. I have installed the extension and reloaded chrome.

Are you seeing some filename like "style.css" which you are clicking?

markphd 2 points · Jun 2013

Here's exactly how I did it.

nmiller616 1 points · Jun 2013

Should we be going through Codeacadmey yet? The HTML Basics?

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

You should do all the assignments listed in this post!

PixlRawH 1 points · Jun 2013

Yay! Great timing, im in! :)

PixlRawH 1 points · Jun 2013

Great timing! Im im :D

PixlRawH 1 points · Jun 2013

Great timing! Im in :D

thomasmurphymusic 1 points · Jun 2013

Thanks for doing this again d0gsbody! I took in the first round, but I think I'll go through it again to do the DevTools course.

frazzlemartini 1 points · Jun 2013

When you say chapters 1-4 of eloquent JS, do you mean up to and including the chapter on debugging? The book version and the html version number the chapters differently.

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

I do mean "up to and including".

I only use the HTML version. The print version has bad reviews on Amazon (I did look at purchasing a copy because I like it so much).

[deleted] 2 points · Jun 2013

I bought the print version of both just because I hate reading books online haha. Cost a small fortune - starting to think my love of books is why I don't have any money.

TheBadger412 1 points · Jun 2013

I hear you brother

[deleted] 1 points · Jun 2013

I'm in, this sounds great.

lafleursv 1 points · Jun 2013

Thank you for providing this again!

firestepper 1 points · Jun 2013

So for the dev tools part... should we do the track or just watch that intro video?

d0gsbody [OP] 2 points · Jun 2013

Do the entire course. It takes about 2 to 3 hours, but it's maximum reward material.

efraglebagga 1 points · Jun 2013

probably gonna get burried, but after reading Eloquent ch1-4 I was curious about arguments implementation and hidden properties. Here is a couple of links on the topic for your convenience

Arguments:

both links are quite interesting. I'm a bit sad about the current implementation vs. the one proposed in Harmony, and the time it's gonna take for it to get here. It looks like coffeescript is much more user friendly in this regard (I actually can't wait to switch to it, it's Haskell like syntax is so beautiful. Gotta learn JS first though :> )

  1. http://javascriptweblog.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/javascripts-arguments-object-and-beyond/
  2. http://www.aminutewithbrendan.com/pages/20101115

Hidden properties:

it looks like the situation is a bit better than Eloquent JS leads as to believe - modern browsers (see [2]) have a way of hiding properties (check out the answer to the stackoverflow question[1])

  1. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2636453/is-it-possible-to-create-a-hidden-property-in-javascript
  2. http://kangax.github.io/es5-compat-table/#Object.defineProperty

also - don't listen to me, I'm a total newb.

nmiller616 1 points · Jun 2013

When is Week 1 going to start?

d0gsbody [OP] 1 points · Jun 2013

Check the sidebar. It's this week.

airwolff 1 points · Jul 2013

Some additional project lists to help sharpen those coding skills:

http://www.dreamincode.net/forums/topic/78802-martyr2s-mega-project-ideas-list/

https://github.com/thekarangoel/Projects

Thanks to Troll_Random for the info...

steve06 1 points · Sep 2013

Are there any plans for a new session any time soon? Thanks.

KhalilDaCoder 1 points · Dec 2013

I AM just starting as well. (12/7/2013) Very Excited! Bought my books and I'm reading Eloquent JavaScript as I type... Great Introduction to the course.

KhalilDaCoder 1 points · Dec 2013

Just finished reading Chapter 2 in the Definitive Guide and completed Part 2 on Codecademy. I am currently typing in the code from Definitive Guide Example 1.2.1 The Javascript Calculator