Thursday, December 19, 2013

Building Polyfills by Brandon Satrom; O'Reilly Media

Building Polyfills is a fun book to read. It’s about how to contribute to the Polyfill community and build something that can make life easier for other JavaScript developers. Brandon Satrom the purpose and history of polyfills and then walks the reader through building a polyfill for HTML 5 Forms using Kendo UI. What makes this book interesting is its scope. This book covers the creation of a polyfill from picking a suitable subject to publishing it through Modenizr and Github. It covers how to decipher the W3C documentation, the basics of git, the merits of various popular JavaScript frameworks, and even experimental Polyfills that can enhance a developer’s toolkit. The book contains code that is both clear and relevant. In the process of learning how to build a Polyfill, the reader is introduced to Kendo UI. 

All of this information is great for JavaScript developers whether or not they’re interested in building their own Polyfills. The only drawback to this book may be that it has an expiration date. Eventually browsers will even themselves out and Polyfills will no longer be necessary. In the meantime, this is a good read for JavaScript Developers.