Eloquent JavaScript, The Annotated Version

[gordonzhu]

This is an annotated version of the second edition of http://eloquentjavascript.net/.

There are two objectives for this project: (1) Add comments to make the text easier to understand. (2) Allow you to ask me questions using comments so you don't get stuck.

The big idea is that you’ll be able to get through the book without any issues and understand everything on a very deep level. I’ve heard from too many people that the first few chapters have been smooth and then the middle to later chapters have been a struggle (which is a big shame). I want the entire book to be a smooth experience so that you can feel confident about JavaScript and can move on to bigger things.

My goal is to create a really useful and lasting resource that helps a ton of people. Please let me know what you think!

If you've struggled through parts of the book before, I'd love to hear about it so that I can spend more energy on the parts where you need it most.

I also posted this on Reddit and it's currently at the top of /r/learnjavascript if you'd like to see the discussion there. http://www.reddit.com/r/learnjavascript/

[gordonzhu]

Crap so if you open the file now you may get a message at the top of the page that says:

"Wow, this file is really popular! Some tools might be unavailable until the crowd clears. Try again. Dismiss."

This sucks because comments don't show when this happens, which is the whole point. Hopefully things will die down later and the comments will be visible again soon.

[marijn]

People keep voting this up, even though the comments are broken. If you're just going to read the book, note that there's a better-formatted, interactive version at http://eloquentjavascript.net

[AlexeyBrin]

Just curios, did this guy asked for your permission to basically republish your book ?

[olov]

I haven't been able to see the comments so I can't give feedback on that, but you should give proper credits to the book's author, Marijn Haverbeke and respect his choice of license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ (summary) and http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/legalcode (full license).

[gordonzhu]

Thanks for pointing this out. I've added Marijn Haverbeke's name to the top of the doc and also linked to the license.

[fridek]

It's a great and well written book already. I'm not sure how can you benefit from annotating it any further. It's important to accept that some books are aimed at a certain level and for people not quite there yet better alternatives exist [1]. There are also some topics that a book needs to just mention and not go into much details, because for a beginner the exact internals of TCP are not useful anyway.

[1] http://jsbooks.revolunet.com/

[emmanueloga_]

That's a nice resource, never saw that page before.

Just to clarify I'd say Eloquent JavaScript is a nice book, and definitely a beginners book. I say this because it seems you are saying the annotations could help "people not quite there".

[fridek]

If you want to spend some time helping people, please consider https://hackpledge.org/

[wil421]

I just bought this book last week and havent dove in yet. Bookmarking this page for future reference.

Can anyone suggest a JS book to read after this one, for someone thats not quite a beginner with programming but trying to improve their JS skill set?

[2mur]

Javascript Allongé [0] by Reg Braithwaite [1]

[0] https://leanpub.com/javascript-allonge/read

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=raganwald

[serve_yay]

> "Below the surface of the machine, the program moves. Without effort, it expands and contracts. In great harmony, electrons scatter and regroup. The forms on the monitor are but ripples on the water. The essence stays invisibly below."

Man, I hate reading stuff like this in technical books.

[choward]

Me too. I already spend a lot of time reading to stay up on technology. I don't need crap like this wasting more of my time.

[whoisthemachine]

This would probably not be trivial, but perhaps it would be better to upload this to Github in Markdown format? Github would allow comments, suggested changes to the original text, version control, etc.

[Ygg2]

Does anyone know the difference between the online version and the published version?

[marijn]

The published version has one bonus chapter. That's basically it (except for a few small mistakes that were caught after the thing went to print -- http://eloquentjavascript.net/errata.html)

[louhike]

Is it only aimed at beginners?

[AlexeyBrin]

Yes, if you already know JavaScript you can probably peak and chose what is interesting for you from the book. Check the actual book website http://eloquentjavascript.net