JavaScript: The Definitive Guide: Master the World's Most-Used Programming Language

Oh, wow, another edition of this classic book. Is it worth "upgrading" that old copy on your bookshelf?

First, if you have any edition prior to the 6th edition the answer is a definitive, "Yes!" There is no question that so much has changed since 2006 which is when the 5th edition was published. JavaScript feels like a whole new language since then (not really, but significant changes in the last 14 years have happened).

But, what if you have the 6th edition? What did David Flanagan change? Overall, the 7th edition comes in at 40% smaller than the 6th edition. Do you keep both? Nope. The 7th edition is much better thought through and eliminates much of the old and adds in important new things.

Seven chapters on "client-side" JavaScript are condensed into one "JavaScript in Web Browsers" chapter. The topics within that chapter are a much tighter presentation of the material you need to know. If you really need to know more about JavaScript and CSS or JQuery, go look to references on these topics. Flanagan was right to trim that fat from this book.

In the 6th edition, there were barely 20 pages focused on server-side JavaScript. Now there is a good chapter dedicated to "Server-Side JavaScript with Node". Finally, he has added a whole new chapter on tools and extensions. In other words, Flanagan has caught up with how JavaScript is really used.

The remaining changes are around the fundamentals. He has added information on symbols and has greatly reworked chapters on object and classes as one would expect. Modules have been split out into their own chapter. And, he has added a good "summary" section to each chapter.

Overall, I think the book has been "refactored" in a good way. It is much tighter. And, certainly more relevant to modern JavaScript programming. Of course, JavaScript will continue to evolve so I expect future editions will continue. But, this edition feels like a checkpoint one should mark. I have done so and my 6th edition is being duly donated.

I first approached JS by buying Eloquent JavaScript and after few chapters I got completely demotivated in continuing studying from that book. Simple concepts were made outrageously complex whereas complex topics didn’t get the treatment they deserved. I then tried few online Udemy courses which were great but can never be as organized as a book.
Then the new edition of Flanagan’s JS guide was released. This book is not an easy bedtime reading. There are tons of concepts to learn there which are often recursive in different chapters, ie you can’t really skip or change the topic sequence of the book.
However I think that the author does a v good job in helping readers understating via precised and short code examples.
So far this is the best book I read on the subject. It is also updated with the latest lexicon of ES6. Remember JavaScript is a living language which get regularly updated and enriched. Books which were good 5yrs ago might not be relevant today any longer. Definitely recommended to whoever is serious in learning the language.

I started building static websites around 2003 and later added Bootstrap foundations which I still use. I've outgrown the javascript snippets from W3schools and I refuse to inject any jQuery in my applications after a recent move to Bootstrap 5. FreeCodeCamp is good, but they belabor small items in their exercises. I don't need 10 exercises on Variables and Scope to learn Javascript.

IMHO, React and Vue are too much work for what I want to do. Maybe I'm just too old for the new stuff. But I'm not building any corporate or mobile apps which seem to embrace the latest Javascript flavors which Facebook (oops, Meta) and Google developed and promote. Vue and Svelte are the underdogs in that world and no one knows if they'll be around 5 years from know.

My favorite books are/were published by WROX, Head First and No Starch Press. They all have a style that allows me to capture the essence of feature/function and provide examples without getting to long winded in other side issues.

Javascript: The Definitive Guide covers the DOM with lots of prose but very few examples. That's the opposite style of the bulk of my technical library, which act as quick reference material when I'm heads down in Visual Studio Code working building an app or component.

Javascript: The Definitive Guide is a very good book It's simply not the style I need. It would probably be a great college textbook. You're not under the gun to build something to pay the rent while you're learning.

My selection for learning Javascript is simply the 4th Edition (2020) of Professional JavaScript for Web Developers by WROX. (I own the 3rd edition and love it.) It doubles as a superb reference manual.

Look if you are a developer wanting to learn JavaScript or if you've been doing it for years like me. Buy this book. It is the JavaScript Bible. End of story.

This is a fantastically written book about Javascript with no detail left out. The author is extremely clear with the explanations, examples and the "why" of you're learning. This updated edition was overdue; I'm so glad he has finally published this. Definitely recommended.

The seventh edition is about 390 pages lighter than the previous edition. Gone are all the references to jQuery and DOM documentation. Almost all XMLHTTPRequest stuff has been replaced with the fetch API (which is good), and there is a lot more content on ES6 stuff such as Promises, async/await, arrow functions and Node.js.

However, if you are looking for a hard copy reference of the JavaScript documentation, you should look at the previous 6th edition or visit the Mozilla Developer Network (MDN) website. Perhaps there is another book that still sees the value of having a hard copy of the JavaScript and DOM documentation still around.

I bought this book because it is one of the few I have seen that claims to address server side JS, which I am learning. However, from the beginning I noticed serious problems.

Firstly, the material is organized in a baffling manner. The logical way to present such topics is to organize them from most familiar/ most used/ least complex to the least used/ most complex topics. You build from the simple to the difficult.

Not here. Chapter 3 covers complex destructuring. and chapter 4 covers bitwise operators, of which the author even says "These operators are not commonly used in JavaScript programming". The mainstay elements that are regularly used, like arrays, loops and functions aren't covered until far later in the book.

The explanations themselves are written in a way to be almost impenetrable. It feels like a book written by someone who started out with assembly code and has mentally compared everything with that ever since; examples are written as if the reader were writing an advanced mathematics engine for a laboratory, not trying to get their fit tracking app to not crash when blocking a popup.

Also, the first three chapters are all but useless; there's a feel of 'summary blurb' about them where the author briefly touches on something but then says 'we actually cover this in chapter 7'. No, cover it first, then make such a point. That's like using a term before it is defined, which also happens.

This book needs focus; figure out what you want to say and whom to say it to, strip out the padding (leave the CSS/ Canvas lesson for an HTML5 book), get things in order from basic to complex, learn how to write an understandable explanation and example, then do it again.

I am highly disappointed with this book. If I hadn't highlighted a few pages at first, I would definitely return it.

A must-have tome for any JS developer! Seriously amazing work by the author.
I was skeptical that a book like this made sense these days being Google is always at my fingertips. But I swear I learn something new and useful every time I pick this masterpiece up! And everything is laid out and indexed in a way that makes finding what you're looking for a breeze. Wouldn't want to be without it.

Great book! Author gives great instruction and examples are on point. A truly great programming book all the way around.

Writing in an everyday speaking terms might make it easier to understand the content.