Where can I learn jQuery? Is it worth it?

Answer 1

Rick Strahl and Matt Berseth's blogs both tipped me into jQuery and man am I glad they did. jQuery completely changes a) your client programming perspective, b) the grief it causes it you, and c) how much fun it can be!

http://www.west-wind.com/weblog/

http://mattberseth.com/

I used the book jQuery in Action http://www.amazon.com/jQuery-Action-Bear-Bibeault/dp/1933988355/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1219716122&sr=1-1 (I bought it used at Amazon for about $22). It has been a big help into bootstrapping me into jQuery. The documentation at jquery.com are also very helpful.

A place where jQuery falls a little flat is with its UI components. Those don't seem to be quite ready for primetime just yet.

It could be that Prototype or MooTools or ExtJS are as good as jQuery. But for me, jQuery seems to have a little more momentum behind it right now and that counts for something for me.

Check jQuery out. It is very cool!

Answer 2

Hey, I am biased in that I now work with these guys, but Carsonified offers some great resources for people learning and improving their jQuery skill set. Just next Monday there is an online conference on jQuery featuring John Resig himself - http://carsonified.com/online-conferences/jquery/

Also, they now offer video tutorials via their membership scheme on the Think Vitamin blog,

I know there's a lot of free resource out there, I guess the difference here is the quality of the content you get. hope it's useful!

Answer 3

I use Prototype, which I like. I'm afraid I don't know jQuery, so I can't compare them, but I think Prototype is worth checking out. Their API docs are generally pretty good, in my experience (which certainly helps with learnability).

Answer 4

I haven't seen JQ-Fundamentals - by Rebecca Murphey mentioned anywhere here.

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It is a very good book. It also explains the fundamentals of JavaScript required to understand the basics of JQuery.

Answer 5

Jquery.com is well organized and has many great examples. You don't need to buy a book. I found it easy to pickup on the fly by just referencing website's documentation. If you're someone who learns best by doing, I'd suggest this approach.

And yes, it's absolutely worth learning. It'll save you a lot of time and you'll actually look forward to doing JavaScript work!

Answer 6

I used Prototype for about six months before I decided to learn jQuery. To me, it was like a night and day difference. For example, in Prototype you will loop over a set of elements checking if one exists and then setting something in it, in jQuery you just say $('div.class').find('[name=thing]') or whatever and set it.

It's so much easier to use and feels a lot more powerful. The plugin support is also great. For almost any common js pattern, there's a plugin that does what you want. With prototype, you'll be googling for blogs that have the snippet of code you need.