This Week in JavaScript - 16 December 2013

JavaScript
1

Your weekly update of interesting happenings in the world of JavaScript - feel free to discuss, and help to bring some new ideas to light.

News

First 3D Commercial Web Game Powered By asm.js Unveiled - complete with free demo
Interview With Jonathan Snook - renowned author, speaker and coder
Famo.us JavaScript framework revealed - a new framework that replaces the browser’s rendering engine with its own

Learn Stuff

Learning jQuery with Street Fighter and Hadoukens - interactive tutorial complete with Ryu and sound effects
Grunt for People Who Think Things Like Grunt are Weird and Hard - title says it all, really
You Don’t Know JS - A JavaScript book series launched through Kickstarter. Thanks @ralph_m ;

Make Stuff

How to Use the HTML5 Vibration API - Sitepoint’s Craig Buckler
Creating Desktop Applications With node-webkit - takes the pain out of offline single-page application development
Create A Privacy Toggle For Accessible Passwords - courtesy of Dudley Storey

Libraries

HTML5+JSON interactive table plugin (and it’s not just for tables)
voix.js - add voice commands to your sites, apps or games
impress.js - a groovy library for online presentations

[hr][/hr]
So, what you think about these recent happenings in JavaScript?
This week, I’d be particularly interested to hear from anyone who uses Grunt and to find out what you use it for.

Please PM us if you have anything of interest for the next issue, and happy reading! - Paul & [URL=“http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/private.php?do=newpm&u=184222”]Pullo

2

This is just amazing. I played a little with the demo for the Unreal engine and I was impressed. The controls seem like they need some work, but overall it’s simply amazing.

I’m not sure what to make of it either. I’m waiting for more compelling projects.

I like this! Used to play Street Fighter in my university years on a rented SNES.

Still not convinced. Maybe I’m too stubborn or stupid, but I really don’t like hand-writing JSON settings. There are tools that do this better and less error prone due to the human factor, as far as I’m concerned.

The author caught my attention with its approach to OO in JS.
He’s highly regarded, but he is a bit wrong about closures, in JS at least.

https://github.com/getify/You-Dont-Know-JS/blob/master/scope%20&%20closures/ch5.md

They require two key characteristics: 1) an outer wrapping function being invoked, to create the enclosing scope 2) the return value of the wrapping function must include reference to at least one inner function that then has closure over the private inner scope of the wrapper.

A closure is already formed when an inner function uses variables declared in the outer function scope. Returning the inner function is the common use of a closure, not the definition of a closure in JS.

That’s a confusion many developers perpetuate which is part why it may seem like a difficult topic, even though closures are so simple to understand.

To note the recent drama involving Joyent and StrongLoop. It’s somehow hurting the nodejs momentum.

He got it wrong. The password field is not a lie. :slight_smile:

3

Hi myty,

Thanks for your comments :slight_smile:

[quote=“myty,post:2,topic:37717”]

I like this! Used to play Street Fighter in my university years on a rented SNES.[/quote]

Not quite sure when you went to uni, but I was there at the end of the 90’s and I used to spend far too much money on playing Street Fighter vs XMen in the Student’s Union.
My favourite character was Cyclops tag temaing with Akuma.
Oh, the signs of a mis-spent youth.

[quote=“myty,post:2,topic:37717”]

Still not convinced. Maybe I’m too stubborn or stupid, but I really don’t like hand-writing JSON settings. There are tools that do this better and less error prone due to the human factor, as far as I’m concerned.[/quote]

I wasn’t either, but I followed this tutorial and was very pleasantly surprised.
I’m really trying to crowbar Grunt into my work flow at the moment.
I got into node recently when I needed it for a Sublime Text plugin to work, now when I read an article about something that requires npm, I’m less likely to click it away.

This was the first I have heard about Strongloop. If you Google them it seems that tehy are trying to hijack the node.js brand.
Do you have any thoughts on this?

[quote=“myty,post:2,topic:37717”]

He got it wrong. The password field is not a lie. :slight_smile:
http://boingboing.net/2006/06/22/hoodie-with-screen-a.html[/QUOTE]

Excellent! I want one of those for Christmas :slight_smile:
Actually, no I don’t, I want one of these: http://www.amazon.co.uk/thumbsUp-PCPRANK-Thumbsup-PC-Prankster/dp/B0031NYDQK

4

In my early-to-mid-90’s uni years:

  • my SF favorite character was Sagat
  • my MK favorite character was Sub-Zero
  • I played countless hours of Donkey Kong Country and Street Racers as Frank
    and I regard these as achievements any hour of any day! :slight_smile:

Thumbsup! PC Prankster

However, it probably shouldn’t be used on computers that control nuclear reactors, security systems for genetically recreated dinosaur parks and/or zombie experimentation units, captured alien spacecraft or freezers packed with delicious ice cream.

That’s a good one. Like this, also for Christmas: http://www.game.co.uk/en/game-christmas-tinner-181968

When coders turn bad: http://gigaom.com/2013/12/02/slap-fight-in-node-js-land/

5

Ah Sagat, I forgot him. He was cool!
Sub-Zero was kind of cool, too, but obviously the king was Raiden

That’s kind of sad to see.
If a simple commit makes people feel more included then it’s a no-brainer, really.

However, when it gets taken to an extreme then no one benefits. I don’t know if you remember the British Ruby Conf being called off after a tweet by Josh Susser and the ensuing debate debacle.
Just plain sad, really.

6

@Pullo ;

Very cool :slight_smile:

7

Hey solidcodes,

Glad you like it :slight_smile:

Which of the articles were you interested in?

8

I was impressed by the monstermadness.com

Anyway all of them are interesting…

Thanks for sharing Pullo…