Comments on: So you want to write Javascript for a living? http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living Cleaning up the web with Ajax Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:55:33 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2 By: Andrew Herron http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247128 Andrew Herron Mon, 12 Feb 2007 16:31:09 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247128 Gonna have to go with Dustin on this one. What's worse is when you wake up in the morning after a beer/code binge, realize you've done something on the sorts of majestic, and yet have difficulty understanding it. Gonna have to go with Dustin on this one. What’s worse is when you wake up in the morning after a beer/code binge, realize you’ve done something on the sorts of majestic, and yet have difficulty understanding it.

]]> By: payitforward http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247123 payitforward Mon, 12 Feb 2007 09:41:31 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247123 Life is too short, JavaScript libraries like Dojo, Prototype save my time. Just water is ok for me. Life is too short, JavaScript libraries like Dojo, Prototype save my time.
Just water is ok for me.

]]> By: Dustin Diaz http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247120 Dustin Diaz Sun, 11 Feb 2007 22:59:44 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247120 Whoever wants to write JavaScript for a living, must also love beer. Period. Whoever wants to write JavaScript for a living, must also love beer. Period.

]]> By: Scott Schiller http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247117 Scott Schiller Sun, 11 Feb 2007 18:59:25 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247117 Great discussion here. I'd like to add from a perspective employer's point of view, "Give me some cool stuff, work or fun, to look at." Provide some URLs to professional work, and even better, personal stuff you've done for yourself or for others, for fun. Demonstrate something nifty, experimental even, which shows your ability at all of the above things (Object-Oriented approach, DOM, memory leaks, event handling, graceful degradation / progressive enhancement / unobtrusive techniques, etc.) If I can see your code, style and approach in any light, that will help potential employers determine what you can do when working for them. My personal experience has been that having a personal site showing both professional and personal work has been invaluable in regards to looking for employment. Great discussion here. I’d like to add from a perspective employer’s point of view, “Give me some cool stuff, work or fun, to look at.” Provide some URLs to professional work, and even better, personal stuff you’ve done for yourself or for others, for fun. Demonstrate something nifty, experimental even, which shows your ability at all of the above things (Object-Oriented approach, DOM, memory leaks, event handling, graceful degradation / progressive enhancement / unobtrusive techniques, etc.) If I can see your code, style and approach in any light, that will help potential employers determine what you can do when working for them. My personal experience has been that having a personal site showing both professional and personal work has been invaluable in regards to looking for employment.

]]> By: Candide http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247112 Candide Sun, 11 Feb 2007 13:18:23 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247112 * Be able to put your script in IE, press 10 times F5, check memory usage, cry out loud ... and manage to fix that. I am living on JS for one year now. I agree that today it is the JS/CSS/DHTML mix that will give you some job. We should all remember it is the market needs that gives us work to do. Technology is just a way to answer these needs. I have done C++ when it was needed the most. Visual Basic at its time. Server side scripting few years ago ... and Ajax-ish stuff today. Keep in mind the code you write is meant to be used by somebody as a product ... whatever the language. * Be able to put your script in IE, press 10 times F5, check memory usage, cry out loud … and manage to fix that.

I am living on JS for one year now. I agree that today it is the JS/CSS/DHTML mix that will give you some job.

We should all remember it is the market needs that gives us work to do. Technology is just a way to answer these needs. I have done C++ when it was needed the most. Visual Basic at its time. Server side scripting few years ago … and Ajax-ish stuff today.

Keep in mind the code you write is meant to be used by somebody as a product … whatever the language.

]]> By: Tom Trenka http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247106 Tom Trenka Sun, 11 Feb 2007 00:39:01 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247106 @scottandrew: good one, I forgot that :) @noname: I would never hire you for this kind of work simply because your ignorance is showing. I got my start with JS not by doing DHTML but by writing a lot of classic ASP using the JScript engine. If you don't understand that JS != browser then in my opinion you don't have a clear understanding of the entire HTML+CSS+JS ecosystem. @Hasin: I disagree with you re: "Choose some popular libraries and stick with them"; even though we in the community try to help people out by evening out the bumps (as it were) you should still be able to figure out how to do some basic and intermediate tasks without relying on an external library--and note that I say this as one of the main contributors to Dojo. Regardless of the fact that a library can be tremendously helpful, you *still need to know what is doing to what and why*. (Unless you're talking about implementations of something like, say, SHA-256. *Then* you should use a library :) @scottandrew: good one, I forgot that :)
@noname: I would never hire you for this kind of work simply because your ignorance is showing. I got my start with JS not by doing DHTML but by writing a lot of classic ASP using the JScript engine. If you don’t understand that JS != browser then in my opinion you don’t have a clear understanding of the entire HTML+CSS+JS ecosystem.
@Hasin: I disagree with you re: “Choose some popular libraries and stick with them”; even though we in the community try to help people out by evening out the bumps (as it were) you should still be able to figure out how to do some basic and intermediate tasks without relying on an external library–and note that I say this as one of the main contributors to Dojo. Regardless of the fact that a library can be tremendously helpful, you *still need to know what is doing to what and why*.
(Unless you’re talking about implementations of something like, say, SHA-256. *Then* you should use a library :)

]]> By: Hasin Hayder http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247098 Hasin Hayder Sat, 10 Feb 2007 17:33:50 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247098 Well, you can do pure JS for living as I am doing right now. Beside lots other tasks in pageflakes, I write huge amount of JS everyweek to develop flakes as a development engineer. Beside that I also maintain the community, study JS in the user submitted flakes and support them to write efficient JS. If you neglect JS as a language, you are doing a big mistake. JS is extremely powerful and you can do things beyond your imagination with it. I want to add some tips beside dion’s suggestions. You also need to do the following if you really want to live by coding JS. 1. DOM Scripting is a Must, but not all, simple Node operations will do. 2. Interacting with CSS is also a must. 3. Manipulating JSON is more important than XML becoz its much more flexible and lightweight to transfer your data as JSON object. 4. Choose some popular libraries and stick to them. Personally I suggest Prototype (Its a must), jQuery, mooTools and Scriptaculous. I dont like Dojo becoz it seems too heavier to me. (I dont agree with Dino in this issue, I suggest DRY, Dont Repeat Yourself. Why do you have to reinvent the wheel?) 5. AJAX is also a must. 6. Being able to write JS in Object Notation format (he he he, its JSON) 7. keep yourself uptodate by visiting sites which inform you what’s actually going on in this sector. 8. Be aware of browser compatibility issues (Its a must) And Finally 9. Love JS Well, you can do pure JS for living as I am doing right now. Beside lots other tasks in pageflakes, I write huge amount of JS everyweek to develop flakes as a development engineer. Beside that I also maintain the community, study JS in the user submitted flakes and support them to write efficient JS. If you neglect JS as a language, you are doing a big mistake. JS is extremely powerful and you can do things beyond your imagination with it.

I want to add some tips beside dion’s suggestions. You also need to do the following if you really want to live by coding JS.

1. DOM Scripting is a Must, but not all, simple Node operations will do.
2. Interacting with CSS is also a must.
3. Manipulating JSON is more important than XML becoz its much more flexible and lightweight to transfer your data as JSON object.
4. Choose some popular libraries and stick to them. Personally I suggest Prototype (Its a must), jQuery, mooTools and Scriptaculous. I dont like Dojo becoz it seems too heavier to me. (I dont agree with Dino in this issue, I suggest DRY, Dont Repeat Yourself. Why do you have to reinvent the wheel?)
5. AJAX is also a must.
6. Being able to write JS in Object Notation format (he he he, its JSON)
7. keep yourself uptodate by visiting sites which inform you what’s actually going on in this sector.
8. Be aware of browser compatibility issues (Its a must)

And Finally

9. Love JS

]]> By: noname http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247097 noname Sat, 10 Feb 2007 16:37:07 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247097 JS by itself is meaningless. You NEED to know HTML/CSS to have your JS working, so nope there is no way to do JS only for a living JS by itself is meaningless. You NEED to know HTML/CSS to have your JS working, so nope there is no way to do JS only for a living

]]> By: camiel http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247095 camiel Sat, 10 Feb 2007 08:48:01 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247095 Well, a good alternative is to use a case based approach: show a real life javascript front-end, (such as my www.fittestmodel.com), and ask any question you like such as: * How come that the selection lists do not have z-index 100% always in IE? How would you do that? * How to prevent repeated server requests (IE) for images when viewing the same image multiple times? * How to force an update request to the server this time, but prevent it the other time. Take for example a tree component. Once brances are populated, and nodes are collapsed afterwards, you do not want to reload the data when the nodes are expanded again. * How to create a counter button which can count both up and down, slower and faster depending on the mouse position on it? * How to switch from absolute positions to relative positions and vice versa. How are those windows arranged? * How can such an application run without xmlhttprequest? etc, etc.. Well, a good alternative is to use a case based approach: show a real life javascript front-end, (such as my http://www.fittestmodel.com), and ask any question you like such as:

* How come that the selection lists do not have z-index 100% always in IE? How would you do that?
* How to prevent repeated server requests (IE) for images when viewing the same image multiple times?
* How to force an update request to the server this time, but prevent it the other time. Take for example a tree component. Once brances are populated, and nodes are collapsed afterwards, you do not want to reload the data when the nodes are expanded again.
* How to create a counter button which can count both up and down, slower and faster depending on the mouse position on it?
* How to switch from absolute positions to relative positions and vice versa. How are those windows arranged?
* How can such an application run without xmlhttprequest?

etc, etc..

]]> By: Hedger http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247094 Hedger Sat, 10 Feb 2007 07:39:24 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247094 ...and Nicholas Zakas of Yahoo! Since I visited his cube almost everyday. :-D …and Nicholas Zakas of Yahoo!
Since I visited his cube almost everyday. :-D

]]> By: scottandrew http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247085 scottandrew Sat, 10 Feb 2007 01:03:57 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247085 One more: domain security. What it is, how it works, how to get around it. One more: domain security. What it is, how it works, how to get around it.

]]> By: Andy Kant http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247084 Andy Kant Fri, 09 Feb 2007 23:54:33 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247084 @Mark There really aren't any restrictions, most of them are pretty much free use (GPL, MIT, etc). However, there are many companies out there that have lawyers that are scared of open-source licenses and prefer to avoid them. @Mark

There really aren’t any restrictions, most of them are pretty much free use (GPL, MIT, etc). However, there are many companies out there that have lawyers that are scared of open-source licenses and prefer to avoid them.

]]> By: Mark http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247081 Mark Fri, 09 Feb 2007 23:09:39 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247081 mean, Which licensing *restrictions*, specifically? (I need to get some sleep) mean, Which licensing *restrictions*, specifically? (I need to get some sleep)

]]> By: Mark http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247080 Mark Fri, 09 Feb 2007 23:08:50 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247080 I'm wondering, from Anonymous JS Guru, what he means specifically by this: "There are several large corporations that cannot (or will not) use the freely-available frameworks like Dojo because of license restrictions" Which licensing subscriptions, specifically? I’m wondering, from Anonymous JS Guru, what he means specifically by this:

“There are several large corporations that cannot (or will not) use the freely-available frameworks like Dojo because of license restrictions”

Which licensing subscriptions, specifically?

]]> By: Rob Sanheim http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247077 Rob Sanheim Fri, 09 Feb 2007 22:11:44 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247077 Hans, Nicholas: I added a link to the original article. Sorry we missed that the first time around! Hans, Nicholas: I added a link to the original article. Sorry we missed that the first time around!

]]> By: Andy Kant http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247076 Andy Kant Fri, 09 Feb 2007 21:56:05 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247076 As someone who programmed pretty much exclusively JavaScript for about the last 6-8 months, I'll give you my opinions of what is important. 1. DOM manipulation 2. JavaScript object types (number, boolean, object, string, Array Date, RegExp, etc), their methods and how to manipulate object structures. Prototype manipulation is useful knowledge but I wouldn't call it necessary. 3. Event handling 4. The big thing is knowing browser compatibilities 5. Understanding of closures 6. How scope is managed 7. Keeping up the latest techniques in JavaScript will be helpful Given that, jobs that are exclusively for JavaScript aren't very common. At my current place of employment, we had a unique situation in that our web applications had a constraint of having to be implemented entirely in JavaScript because we needed to be operating system independent without having a dependency on Java or a server-side processor. This was a pretty big hassle as implementing a multi-browser library for file i/o manipulation in JavaScript isn't easy and isn't what JavaScript is really meant for. As someone who programmed pretty much exclusively JavaScript for about the last 6-8 months, I’ll give you my opinions of what is important.

1. DOM manipulation
2. JavaScript object types (number, boolean, object, string, Array Date, RegExp, etc), their methods and how to manipulate object structures. Prototype manipulation is useful knowledge but I wouldn’t call it necessary.
3. Event handling
4. The big thing is knowing browser compatibilities
5. Understanding of closures
6. How scope is managed
7. Keeping up the latest techniques in JavaScript will be helpful

Given that, jobs that are exclusively for JavaScript aren’t very common. At my current place of employment, we had a unique situation in that our web applications had a constraint of having to be implemented entirely in JavaScript because we needed to be operating system independent without having a dependency on Java or a server-side processor. This was a pretty big hassle as implementing a multi-browser library for file i/o manipulation in JavaScript isn’t easy and isn’t what JavaScript is really meant for.

]]> By: JoeBoy http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247073 JoeBoy Fri, 09 Feb 2007 20:01:42 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247073 I basically write javascript for a living, keep very busy. It's not the only thing I do but it it is 90% of it, so the contention that "nobody survives on javascript alone" is absolutely false. I basically write javascript for a living, keep very busy. It’s not the only thing I do but it it is 90% of it, so the contention that “nobody survives on javascript alone” is absolutely false.

]]> By: Jesse Kuhnert http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247072 Jesse Kuhnert Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:49:32 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247072 Thomas: That was spot on. It's no wonder your library is doing so well.. :) Thomas: That was spot on. It’s no wonder your library is doing so well.. :)

]]> By: Andrew Herron http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247071 Andrew Herron Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:49:05 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247071 Thanks for the link Nicholas, would have been nice if Dion has put a link in there or at least gave credit. Thanks for the link Nicholas, would have been nice if Dion has put a link in there or at least gave credit.

]]> By: Alexei http://ajaxian.com/archives/so-you-want-to-write-javascript-for-a-living/comment-page-1#comment-247067 Alexei Fri, 09 Feb 2007 18:32:09 +0000 http://ajaxian.com/?p=2105#comment-247067 I also think its good to have an advanced knowledge of CSS, DHTML and such. particularly where it applies to browser differences, etc. I also think its good to have an advanced knowledge of CSS, DHTML and such. particularly where it applies to browser differences, etc.

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