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Head Rush Ajax (Head First)
vBulletin Book Store > vBulletin books beginning with H
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Head Rush Ajax (Head First) |
Author: Brett McLaughlin
Published: 2006-03-28 |
List price: $39.99
Our price: $26.39
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Usually ships in 24 hours
As of: August 07th, 2008 07:14:29 PM
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Customer comments on this selection.
 A fun read, but don't use it on the job...
The book is humourous and a pleasant read, and a fun way to learn Ajax in your easy chair by the fireplace.
But *don't* try using it on the job.
I tried building a real-world application with this as my guide - as I went through each chapter, I'd use the methods conveyed by the examples to build my own project. This went well until I got to the section on POST requests. As before, I adapted the example to my own project - and it didn't work. The problem is that the code on page 299 is flat-out wrong, and they don't tell you this until page 308 - after a several-page diversion into another subject. Then, on page 308, they finally reveal that on page 299 they had skipped an essential (but non-obvious) step.
Meanwhile, I had wasted about half an hour wondering why the back-end application wasn't receiving any of the form contents, putting in javascript in the front-end to display what it was sending before it sent it, putting logging in the back end to dump the inputs to files for analysis.
My copy now has "WRONG" written in one-inch letters across page 299.
(I was reminded of an episode of M*A*S*H. An unexploded bomb was in the camp, and Hawkeye was trying to defuse it while Radar read him the instructions - slowly, one step at a time - from a safe distance. The instructions were something like "Cut the red wire. But if there are also two black wires, you must not cut the red wire.")
Authors, I can appreciate your writing style and your general method of teaching - but please be aware that some programmers like to test our applications incrementally, and leaving a booby trap in the code just wastes our time.
 Avoid like the plague!
A conceptually solid intro to AJAX plagued by errors in the code samples -- see http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/headra/errata/headra.unconfirmed. Even some of the sample ajax apps running on the headfirstlabs site don't work! For instance, visit http://www.headfirstlabs.com/books/hrajax/chapter02/breakneck/pizza.html, type in a phone#, and watch as the php incorrectly dumps out all the addresses in the mock database. Did the author even bother to test out the sample apps?
 We all learn in different ways
Some people prefer dense reference-like texts while others get droopy eyelids after just a few pages. Face it--this is complex material we are trying to learn. The O'Reilly Head First series has really figured out how to present concepts that can be difficult to understand, especially for people who are new to the field, in a way that makes it easy to learn.
If you are new to Ajax or if you have some experience with it but want to fill in the gaps, this is a great book.
Learn the fundamentals, quickly and clearly
This book does exactly what it claims to do: teach you what Ajax is, and the basics of using it. After finishing this book, I feel like I have an extremely solid base with which to read and understand a more advanced book. This book didn't teach me any best practices, common Ajax patterns, cool tricks, or anything else fancy; it just gave me a firm, solid understanding of how to use Ajax, and that's exactly what I needed.
 Indirect learning - doesnt work for me
The book spends about 20 pages introducing you to their genius learning methodologies that keep you interested and involved. That would be great if I was reading this book to kill time and had to be kept interested with pictures and games. In reality, I want to learn the material as quickly and directly as possible. If you are like this, skimming the book is about all you can do. I skimmed it in about 20 minutes (I have previous Ajax knowledge) and it was an OK Intro refresher. If you are serious about learning this and have an attention span greater than a 6 year old, you do NOT want to get this book. It's like playing Where's Waldo for relevant information among the spam of dialog boxes and arrows zig-zagging across the screen.
With that said, if you are learning Ajax grudgingly and don't care how much time you spend, this book will be great.
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