JavaScript is not like other languages, it requires a different programming paradigm. I knew of JavaScript’s prototypal and functional nature, but I hadn’t ever grasped the power of lexical scoping, closure and object literals covered here.

Another common struggle with JavaScript is its faults. “Quality was not a motivating concern in the design, implementation, or standardisation of JavaScript,” says Crockford. “That puts a greater burden on the users of the language to resist the language’s weaknesses.”

This book describes a subset of JavaScript that we can use safely and that keeps its elegance, flexibility and highly expressive power.

And there is more: A brief reference to standard JavaScript methods, a chapter on Style that makes the case for well written code, a detailed examination of Regular Expressions that made my head hurt, diagrammatic documentation of JavaScript grammar and syntax, and invaluable references to JSLint (a code quality tool) and JSON (the data interchange format).

All of this in 176 pages. I became a fan of Douglas Crockford’s work after watching his excellent “ Crockford on JavaScript” lecture series online. Five lectures changed the way I think about JavaScript. I was delighted to receive a free copy of JavaScript: The Good Parts as part of the O’Reilly Blogger Review Program and to have the opportunity to explore this topic further and put my thoughts together.

Part history, part story, part exploration of the essence of programming and software development, Dreaming in Code was primarily a good read. From my techie perspective, i realised that the problems I face as a developer are inherent in the tools and technology I have to deal with, and with the type of mental challenges and associated geekish personality traits that go into doing this work. I recognised myself and the types of decisions I’ve made on the projects I’ve worked on over the last six or seven years.

“Making software is hard”. We work in a difficult field, and it’s not getting any easier… but somehow, despite the seeming hopelessness of all it describes, this book made me feel calmer about my work. So it’s hard, but it’s got an essence, a history and I love it.

Check the book website for an excerpt and links to purchase.