Drupal 6 JavaScript and jQuery

I just finished reading a new book, Drupal 6 JavaScript and jQuery, by Matt Butcher. The book title makes it sound highly specialized, but in fact it's a great resource for a variety of readers, from Drupal beginners to JavaScript experts. Best of all, the book brings together two of my favorite open source technologies: Drupal and jQuery. If you aren't already a fan, I've written elsewhere about Drupal's benefits, and for jQuery, one statement should win you over: query HTML content using plain old CSS selectors!

Matt does a great job leading the reader from very basic principles to advanced concepts, thoroughly enough to initiate less experienced coders, but quickly enough to get everyone to real meat right away. You will get immediate value from this book whether you are a web designer just starting out with Drupal and/or JavaScript, an intermediate coder looking to expand your skills with either Drupal or JavaScript, or an advanced Drupalista or JavaScriptor looking to bring the two together.

Because I reach under the Drupal hood only sporadically, I love how how Matt quickly covers all the basic terminology and functionality of Drupal, JavaScript, and jQuery to remind me how they all work, and work together. I can see turning to this book as a basic reference again and again.

Best of all, in each chapter Matt provides a hands-on project worth doing for it's own sake as well as for the added learning. Trying it out, I modified the rotating sticky node teasers project in Chapter 3 to complete something I've been wanting to do here on my blog for some time: make my Flickr-stream header images rotate dynamically. Read more about exactly how I did it. If I can do something like this in just a few minutes, that tells you a lot about the power and simplicity of Drupal and jQuery together, and Matt's ability to make it all understandable.

Ready to dip your toes or delve deeper into how jQuery let's you "write less, do more" with Drupal? You can buy Matt's Drupal 6 JavaScript and jQuery book directly from the Packt website.

FYI: I drafted this entire review sitting on an Oregon coast beach using the Evernote iPhone app. Pretty nice working conditions ;)