JavaScript FAQ

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JavaScript/JScript Documentation

3. Read any good JavaScript books lately?

Yes! As with computer books generally, texts on browser scripting are plentiful, but the number of good ones is surprisingly small. Nor are the best ones always the most visible. Intranet Journal's favorites, for instance, include a pair of texts from British publisher Wrox Press Ltd.:

• Instant Netscape Dynamic HTML Programmer's Reference (Wrox Press, Aug 1997) by Alex Homer & Chris Ullman
• Instant IE4 Dynamic HTML Programmer's Reference (Wrox Press, July 1997) by Alex Homer & Chris Ullman

These programmer's references are so good because they work from the browser object model up, recognizing fundamental differences between the Microsoft and Netscape approaches. As the titles suggest, they treat the gamut of client-side techniques for making web pages dynamic: JavaScript, VBScript, Layers and Style Sheets. They excel as references for each.

The Wrox books are written for a programming audience. Also in this cateogry, but with different emphases, are the following:

• Dynamic HTML: The Definitive Reference (O'Reilly, July 1998) by Danny Goodman. A compendium for Web content developers that contains reference material for all of the HTML tags, CSS style attributes, browser document objects, and JavaScript objects.
• Netscape ONE Developer's Guide (Sams Publishing, April 1997) by William Robert Stanek & Blake Benet Hall. This programmer's guide to developing commercial-grade Web sites for the Netscape 2.x environment covers client- and server-side scripting in detail.
• JavaScript: The Definitive Guide (O'Reilly, June 1998), by David Flanagan. One of O'Reilly's Nutshell Handbooks, this guide furthers a tradition that includes Larry Wall's Programming Perl and definitive texts on every Unix utility. But why a rhino?

Beginners and less technical webmasters may find one of the following sources a more suitable introduction to scripting.

• Practical Javascript Programming (M&T Books, March 1997), by Reaz Hoque. Contains extensive plug & play code samples, plus an introduction to Netscape's server-side langauge, LiveWire Pro.
• JavaScript Bible, 3nd Ed. (IDG Books, March 1998), by Danny Goodman.
• JavaScript Sourcebook (John Wiley & Sons, Aug 1996), by Gordon McComb.

• Programming JavaScript for Netscape 2.0 (New Riders, 1996), by Tim Ritchey. Older, rich in background, emphasizes JavaScript as stepping stone to Java.