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livingdebI've been looking at JavaScript for Dummies again, and now I realize why I stopped in the middle of chapter four last time. It's because the author explains things in the wrong order. She spends a great deal of time explaining how it's okay if you don't understand everything yet and how she's about to explain some more in a later chapter.
This is particularly offensive because JavaScript is not a compiled language which means that you have to write the code in the order in which you want the computer to use it. In other words, the author is an expert at putting things in order so that everything makes sense knowing only what has gone before. She'll do it for a computer, but she won't do it for her readers.
Also, she makes you claw your way through a summary of everything (six chapters) before she lets you try anything. That's no fun.
What is fun (warning: my teachers in high school said I was bad at transitioning) is sliding down stairs. At least my sister said that her new kids enjoyed sliding down the carpeted stairs at their new house. On their bellies, I think she said. You can do that? I don't quite understand, but I definitely want to try this next time I am over there.
I wonder if it will by like the "dune surfing" at Monahans Sandhills State Park in west Texas. You get this little saucer-shaped sled and slide down the sand dunes (this is currently pictured on the above link, on the third picture from the top). Except that it doesn't work for grown-ups. Or at least I couldn't get it to work. Not even with a running jump. (Yes, that hurt.)
Will I just be lying on the stairs making grunting noises? I'll let you know.
This is particularly offensive because JavaScript is not a compiled language which means that you have to write the code in the order in which you want the computer to use it. In other words, the author is an expert at putting things in order so that everything makes sense knowing only what has gone before. She'll do it for a computer, but she won't do it for her readers.
Also, she makes you claw your way through a summary of everything (six chapters) before she lets you try anything. That's no fun.
What is fun (warning: my teachers in high school said I was bad at transitioning) is sliding down stairs. At least my sister said that her new kids enjoyed sliding down the carpeted stairs at their new house. On their bellies, I think she said. You can do that? I don't quite understand, but I definitely want to try this next time I am over there.
I wonder if it will by like the "dune surfing" at Monahans Sandhills State Park in west Texas. You get this little saucer-shaped sled and slide down the sand dunes (this is currently pictured on the above link, on the third picture from the top). Except that it doesn't work for grown-ups. Or at least I couldn't get it to work. Not even with a running jump. (Yes, that hurt.)
Will I just be lying on the stairs making grunting noises? I'll let you know.