Resources about JavaScript and Node.js

ECMAScript 2015 (aka ES6)

• Language Specification by ECMA (June 2015):
  • HTML version
  • PDF version
• Internationalization API Specification by ECMA (June 2015):
  • PDF version
• Free books, readable online:
  • “Exploring ES6” by Axel Rauschmayer
  • “Setting up ES6” by Axel Rauschmayer (specifically on “how to set up ES6 projects that are compiled to ES5 via Babel 6”; 95% complete at the time of writing)
  • “Understanding ECMAScript 6” by Nicholas C. Zakas
  • “JavaScript Allongé, the ‘Six’ Edition» by Reginald Braithwaite
  • “You Don't Know JS” by Kyle Simpson (book series)
• JS reference at Mozilla Developer Network (probably the best reference out there)
• ES6 compatibility table (very useful: what browsers/runtimes support what versions/features of JS)
• ES6 cheatsheet (a short compilation of the new features, with examples)
• Running JS on the command line (apart from Node.js):
  • Mozilla's Spidermonkey: package libmozjs-24-bin in both Debian and Ubuntu; invoke binary js24.
  • Oracle's Nashorn: part of Java 8 JRE; probably package openjdk-8-jre-headless; invoke binary jjs.

Old JavaScript

• Free books, readable online:
  • “Speaking JavaScript: An In-Depth Guide for Programmers” by Axel Rauschmayer
  • “Eloquent JavaScript” by Marijn Haverbeke
• Non-free books (available in digital and print editions):
  • “JavaScript: The Good Parts” by Douglas Crockford: (short book by one of the gurus, highlighting the best features of the language and explaining how to avoid the bad parts of JS)
  • “JavaScript: The Definitive Guide” by David Flanagan (comprehensive and very accurate, the best reference for the language and the “Bible” before ES6)
  • “Functional Javascript” by Michael Fogus (focuses on one of the strongest points of Javascript, namely the ability to write in a very functional style)
  • “ Effective JavaScript: 68 Specific Ways to Harness the Power of JavaScript” by David Herman
• JS in one picture (interactive mindmap with the syntax of the language)
• “The ECMAScript Internationalization API” (introduction by the editor of the first edition)

Node.js

Main documentation: W3C's official Node.js best practices, recommended tools and template projects (public GH repository).

• Official site:
  • API reference
  • ES6 support
• Interactive guide to package.json (what's the syntax, what's the meaning of each section, what possible values it can have)
• node-inspector (a very useful package to debug and inspect Node.js applications)
• Non-free books by O'Reilly (available for Kindle and in paperback):
  • “Web Development with Node and Express: Leveraging the JavaScript Stack” by Ethan Brown (a good, easy-to-follow tutorial about development with Node.js using one of its most popular packages, express)
• Commands for Node.js development and debugging (GitHub Gist listing simple commands to run and debug apps and test suites using mocha)
• For testing and sharing PoC's and quick/simple pages/apps, these public services are useful:
  • RunKit
  • CodeSandbox

npm

• Official site:
  • Documentation & reference
  • package.json reference & syntax
  • Semantic versioning in npm packages
  • W3C packages
• Semantic versioning (semver) official site

Meta

• “Essential JavaScript Links” by Eric Elliott and contributors
• “JS: The Right Way” by BrazilJS and contributors