I've avoided the use of Javascript as much as possible, possibly due to my adverse reaction to this book (3rd edition) on my first read. Now I'm rereading it because I need so use Javascript on some pages. But in between the first and second read I've gotten much more fluent in both Java and Perl so I really trust that I'm competent to read it and most programming/scripting books. But just like on my first read the book, and maybe the language, are just as offputting as they were before.
I'm not really sure why that is but I think that the first section just doesn't do a very good job of explaining the internals. Or perhaps the internals just indicate a real hodgepodge of a language. I'm currently reading Learning Perl Objects Modules and References and it explains a very complex subject far more clearly than this. And that's not due to the humor. It just explains things more clearly. But what I really can't figure out is if that is because Perl, like Java, is just a language that is far more logical than Javascript or whether the explanations of those languages in the books I've read are just far better than this.
Sorry to rain on everybody's parade but after finding myself suffering mental anguish as I try to read through this for the second time I have to think that it's not just me.
I'm guessing that most people like it for the reference section. And they may be right. But trying to understand the language by reading the first part if like reading the manuals that used to come with software. All they did was give you a headache. I've probably read 100 O'Reilly books so I think that should be evidence enough that I don't have trouble with difficult books. There's just something about this one that makes it torture to read.
I wish it were not so.
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