Book Review – jQuery in Action

April 19, 2008 | Published in: Reviews | Tags: , , , 2

jQuery in ActionJQuery is one of many open-source JavaScript frameworks available; it so happens to be my favorite and is used in many large websites (for example MSNBC) proving it to be one of the best libraries available. You may have noticed that in the past I reviewed Learning jQuery which was aimed at beginners, but for the advanced user, or someone with prior JavaScript knowledge, this may be a tad too basic; if your looking for a more in depth read perhaps the following book is the one for you…

JQuery in Action is a book i have been reading recently which will help you “get up and running with jQuery quickly and efficiently”; it is aimed at novice to advanced users. Read on for my full review.

Book Information

Full Title:
jQuery in Action
Author(s):
Bear Bibeault, Yehuda Katz
Pages:
376
Published:
February 2008
Publisher:
Manning
ISBN:
978-1933988351

My Review

JQuery in Action, aimed at novice to advanced users, is based on jQuery 1.2.1. It explains how to get started with jQuery right up to the advanced AJAX functionality that jQuery helps you implement. It covers all of the official jQuery documentation, and in many ways is far superior due to the quality of the explanations and examples.

The Good

I found the book to be interesting throughout; it maintained my interest and flowed nicely. I read it from cover to cover with no problems. Not only that, it also has a brilliant index making it a good reference resource when writing code.

The code examples in this book are clear and well explained; the source code is also available for download from the web site.

JQuery functions are shown in the various chapters – I love how the function syntax boxes are styled differently so that they stand out from the page.

One good feature of this book that is absent from others I have read is that native JavaScript code is shown throughout the book; jQuery equivalents are afterwards. I found that this really emphasized how much jQuery makes JavaScript coding easier.

The Bad, and the ugly

There were virtually no bad points to this book. If I was to really nit pick I would say that it seemed a bit odd to explain plugin creation in chapter 7, then move on to AJAX in chapter 8, then back to plugins in 9. I would have reordered these chapters for a better flow.

The only other bad point is that some of the diagrams looked a bit hard to read because of there colouring/fills but this was not a major problem.

Book Contents

  1. Introduction – An introduction to jQuery in general, the jQuery function ($()), and other core functionality.
  2. Creating the wrapped element set – A chapter covering element selectors.
  3. Bringing pages to life with jQuery – Manipulating a modifying the DOM.
  4. Events are where it happens! – Event handlers and triggers.
  5. Sprucing up with animations and effects – A guide on jQuery’s built in effects and how to make your own animation.
  6. jQuery utility functions – Detecting browsers, using jQuery with other libraries, manipulating JavaScript objects, dynamically loading scripts (I learnt something new here!)
  7. Extending jQuery with custom plugins – Using and writing plugins for jQuery
  8. Talk to the server with AJAX – Exaplanation of AJAX and jQuery’s implementation on AJAX
  9. Prominent, powerful, and practical plugins – Explanation of useful plugins that extend jQuery’s functionality, including jQuery UI plugins.

The appendices cover JavaScript fundamentals such as an explanation of objects; this is useful if you skipped learning JavaScript and went straight to jQuery as it will help develop your understanding!


Conclusion

In conclusion, jQuery in Action is a really good read with well structured chapters and good examples. Not only did the book flow nicely from start to finish, it also contained a useful index for looking up functions quickly. Code examples were well formatted, and functions were styled to stand out from the page; useful when flicking through.

Verdict: 8.5/10 – A great read with tons of useful information; jQuery in Action is a recommended book for current jQuery developers who want a good reference book to use whilst developing, JavaScript developers yet to see the benefits of jQuery, or anyone planning on using jQuery in the future.

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2 Responses to “Book Review – jQuery in Action”

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  • 1 - Rey Bango says: Reply to this comment

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    Thx for the review. I’ll be sure to pass along your review to Yehuda.

    Rey – jQuery Project Team

    Comment made on April 20, 2008 at 12:42 am

  • 2 - Andre says: Reply to this comment

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    Thanks for this review. I´m just diving into JQuery as one of my clients demands the use of JQuery (for whatever reason). But hey, JQuery sounds quite interesting…

    Comment made on April 21, 2008 at 11:06 am

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