Of all the Ajax-specific frameworks that have popped up in recent years, one clearly stands out as the industrial strength solution. Dojo is not just another JavaScript toolkit -- it's the JavaScript toolkit -- and Dojo: The Definitive Guide demonstrates how to tame Dojo's extensive library of utilities so that you can build rich and responsive web applications like never before. Dojo founder Alex Russell gives a foreword that explains the "why" of Dojo and of this book. Dojo provides an end-to-end solution for development in the browser, including everything from the core JavaScript library and turnkey widgets to build tools and a testing framework. Its vibrant open source community keeps adding to Dojo's arsenal, and this book provides an ideal companion to Dojo's official documentation. Dojo: the Definitive Guide gives you the most thorough overview of this toolkit available, showing you everything from how to create complex layouts and form controls closely resembling those found in the most advanced desktop applications with stock widgets, to advanced JavaScript idioms to AJAX and advanced communication transports. With this definitive reference you get:

• Get a concise introduction to Dojo that's good for all 1.x versions

• Well-explained examples, with scores of tested code samples, that let you see Dojo in action

• A comprehensive reference to Dojo's standard JavaScript library (including fundamental utilities in Base, Dojo's tiny but powerful kernel) that you'll wonder how you ever lived without

• An extensive look at additional Core features, such as animations, drag-and-drop, back-button handling, animations like wipe and slide, and more

• Exhaustive coverage of out-of-the-box Dijits (Dojo widgets) as well as definitive coverage on how to create your own, either from scratch or building on existing ones

• An itemized inventory of DojoX subprojects, the build tools, and the DOH, Dojo's unit-testing framework that you can use with Dojo -- or anywhere else

If you're a DHTML-toting web developer, you need to read this book -- whether you're a one-person operation or part of an organization employing scores of developers. Dojo packs the standard JavaScript library you've always wanted, and Dojo: The Definitive Guide helps you transform your ideas into working applications quickly by leveraging design concepts you already know.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 18 Ratings

Useful - 2009-03-24
Reviewer Rating:
This book does a good job of being a helpful reference manual with just a little extra.

Anyone who has worked/struggled at all in depth with Dojo will tell you one of the most difficult things about it is the documentation. Often times in my projects I have found myself absolutely frustrated because the documentation is too sparse, or an example from 3-4 months ago will not work with the latest version I am using.

That being said the book overall functions better as a reference manual when you need a little more explanation behind specific parts of the framework than a "sit down and read cover to cover" manual. It has definitely come in handy more than a few times when the online documentation and archived community input did not include enough detail to accomplish what I needed.

Better than "Mastering Dojo" by the "other Russell" - 2009-02-21
Reviewer Rating:
This book is more detailed and has more practical documentation and answers than "Mastering Dojo", which I found preachy and unnecessarily opinionated. Buy this book before that one. It helped me solve some tricky widget related problems.

On the other hand, this book does contain a lot of typos and even at least one instance of text which was repeated (copy paste paste).

Not comparable to Javascript the definitive guide - 2009-04-30
Reviewer Rating:
This book covers most of the main dojo/dijit components - but is quite lacking with regards to the dojox area. As a "Definitive" guide - these topics should be covered in depth. One of the best Javascript books I've found was "Javascript - The Definitive Guide". A superb book with detailed reference material. In comparison, the Dojo version falls way short when used as a reference guide. Dojo has so many quirks and pitfalls that it is almost better to just delve into the the source code to find out exactly how something works - unless books are willing to go into extensive details. As such, this book does not, and is not up to par with what I had expected from a "definitive" guide.

bad examples and error prone - 2009-04-10
Reviewer Rating:
This book doesn't do justice to an otherwise excellent series. The examples are error prone and just do not work. Usually a technical book provides the complete source code. You just need to unzip and then run it. But not so for this book. It's extremely frustrating when you're trying to learn something new. As well it depends on an external dojo src link which may/may not be available. I don't think the author even tested out the src code. If he had it would have been simple to just include it. It's unclear what version you should actually use too. This makes a huge difference for the examples. It also missed out a section on simple select buttons it talked about advanced select options and everything else. I'm going to return this one.

Best book on DOJO. Period. - 2009-01-24
Reviewer Rating:
This is the best book on DOJO out there. The dopes that gave it anything less than four stars are smoking crack. Why should it be the author's fault if you don't know what the hell you're doing? Don't let them dissuade you. This book rocks!

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