Introduction In this post we're going to explore writing Backbone.js applications with a Ruby back-end. To assist with this, we're going to use Sinatra – a DSL (domain specific language) for rapidly creating web applications in Ruby. Similar to the … Continue reading
Some exciting news to share today! I'm joining Google as a Developer Programs Engineer on the Chrome team. I'll be lucky to join an incredibly talented team of developers including Paul Irish, Eric Bidelman and Paul Kinlan (to name but … Continue reading
This article will be appearing in my forthcoming book on Backbone.js and continues the section on unit testing. We previously looked at Jasmine and will now look at QUnit and SinonJS. QUnit is a powerful JavaScript test suite written by … Continue reading
Over the past year or so I've been actively trying to encourage more developers to invest time in learning about the benefits of design patterns and how they can be applied to JavaScript. To help with this, I wrote a … Continue reading
Hey guys. Here are the slides for a talk I gave at jQuery Conf (Europe), where I presented a number of effective design patterns for scaling and decoupling your JavaScript (and jQuery) powered web apps. If you've watched my videos … Continue reading
I just really dig JavaScript. I'm a writer, speaker and a JavaScript developer for AOL (yes, we're still around!).
I'm also a member of the jQuery core [Bug Triage/Docs/Learning] teams where I (try) to assist with bugs, documentation and developer evangelism. Some of my other OS work has included contributions to Modernizr and other similar projects.
My personal OS projects include jQuery UI Bootstrap and TodoMVC, which helps developers compare JavaScript MVC frameworks. I've also written 'Backbone Fundamentals' and 'Essential JavaScript Design Patterns' and occasionally tech review books like 'JavaScript Web Applications'.
First do it, then do it right, then do it better. This is one fundamental I always keep in mind when developing anything.
If you're a developer wishing to learn something new, regardless of skill-level, remember that as important as it is to read, it's equally as important to get out there and *do*.
Create a new gist or fiddle, pop open the console and experiment. It's effing fun.
Finally, try to be open to constructive criticism - none of us know everything and at worst, you might just learn something new that will help you become a better developer.
I feel honored to have quite a few friends, many of who are spread across the world but remain active and passionate at what they do.
Thanks to @mathias and @jdalton for giving us jsPerf, @divya, @necolas and @paul_irish for h5bp, @peolanha for always being available for a tech review, @jaubourg for just being awesome, the guys at @bocoup for their constant badassery and the rest of the OT-crew for being ah-mazing.
Last but not least, thanks to @elleohellez for understanding my obsession with the web and being the best a guy could ask for.
