JavaScript Saga

We will continue with the JavaScript exercise on Wednesday. Also, Pat has just informed me that there were problems with the server so people could not have logged in, as we saw. These problems have now been fixed and you should be able to log in.

The next weeks we will continue to practice JavaScript. It is important that you do all the homeworks, in order. I won't be taking points off for homeworks that are a few days late. I would much rather you take the time to learn the basics of JavaScript than try to move on to even more complicated topics. Note that the rest of this class is about JavaScript (mostly), and everything builds upon the basics we are learning now. Now, go have some fun with JavaScript!

Bespin: Your Future Developement Environment

Right now everyone uses standard applications such as eclipse, netbeans, aptana, bluefish, emacs, etc. to do their development. We call them IDEs for integrated development environments. However, this will likely change in the future. Bespin is an IDE that runs in the browser. Yes, completely in your browser, storing your files in the cloud. Bespin is written in 100% JavaScript and uses canvas, which we will be learning about later in class, for drawing graphics. The current version is still an alpha release but it is already amazing.

So, go sign up and play with it! In case you are still unsure about what I mean by web applications: Bespin is a web application. This class is about learning to write software such as Bespin.

Design Presentation Slides

Jason Beaird has graciously posted the slides from his talk. They appear below. He has some very good rules of thumb that you should try to apply to all the projects we will be doing in class, starting with Monday's Farmers' Market homework. Note that on Monday's class there will not be any new exercise. I will instead go over each one of your homeworks individually and give you some feedback.

Design for Future Developers

View more presentations from jasongraphix.

Your Grades are in the Mail

I have just sent out an email to each one of you with your quiz 1 and exercise 1 grades. If you did not receive it then please email me since I probably do not have your correct email. I you want to get these emails at a different address just let me know.

First Day

First, thank you all for taking this class. Please, let your friends know that there is plenty of space available. I also want to re-iterate some of the points I made in class today:

1. There are no in-class lectures in this class. All lectures are streaming videos. The first lecture is posted and is due by Wednesday the 21.
2. We will meet every Monday and Wednesday in the Linux lab: Swearingen 1D43. Quizes and exercises will be done in class and these count for two thirds of your grade, the other third is the homeworks.
3. Please subscribe to this blog's feed and feel free to comment and ask questions, that is what the comment section is for.

As always, I welcome any comments and suggestions you might have on improving the class.

The State of the Web

As a practising software engineer it is important for you to keep abreast of what is going on in the business, especially in the fast-changing world of web application development. The State of the Web 2008 survey gives us an idea of what it going on now with the early-adopter web developers (both web designers and web developers).

A couple of findings are especially relevant for this class:

1. 95% are Javascript developers, and more than half of them are using it for complex interactions or AJAX. Javascript is a basic skill you need to master.
2. The jquery library is used overwhelmingly. Looks like we will be learning jquery this semester.
3. Linux and Unix dominate the server room along with apache, as always. Your time spent learning linux basics will be well rewarded.

If you want to more data on which servers and OS are popular on the web, check out the Netcraft survey

Grading

The grade is based on three aspects:

1. The Monday quizes. These quizes are quick and meant simply to verify that you are keeping up with the lectures and the readings. Remember that the "lectures" are actually videos that you must watch at home. I might give a quiz even if I have not explicitly stated that I will so, always be up to date on the lectures and readings.
2. The in-class exercises. These are more in-depth tests of your ability to apply the knowledge you have acquired.
3. The homeworks. These are longer projects that will challenge your creativity and resourcefulness.

The final grade will be computed using these weights:

Quizes	30%
Exercises	30%
Homeworks	40%

Schedule

Due Date	Lecture	Required Reading	Homework
Jan. 12	Class Introduction.	None	None
Jan. 14		None	None
Jan. 19	No Classes
Jan. 21	Internet and HTTP	Lecture slides wikipedia entry for HTTP list of status codes list of HTTP headers list of Internet media types
Jan. 26	HTML and XHTML	Lecture slides HTML Tutorial XHTML Tutorial
Feb. 2	Cascading Style Sheets	Lecture slides CSS Tutorial
Feb. 4	Invited Talk: We meet in 2A27 Jason Beaird Principles of Beautiful Web Design
Feb. 9			State Farmer's Market Website
Feb. 11	JavaScript Introduction	Lecture slides JavaScript tutorial
Feb. 16	Advanced JavaScript		JavaScript Homework
Feb. 18
Feb. 23	JavaScript in the Browser	DHTML Tutorial
March 2	JavaScript in Browser and jQuery	jQuery slides	Brain Age Homework
March 4
March 9	Spring Break
March 11	Spring Break
March 16			Ajax homework
March 18	SVG and Canvas	Lecture slides	Canvas exercise
March 23			SVG Exercise
March 25	Google Ajax APIs	Google Ajax API homepage Ajax API playground	Functional calculator exercise
March 30
April 1	Gears	Gears lecture slides Gears API
April 6	No classes
April 8
April 13			Gradebook web application
April 15
April 20
April 22
April 27
May 4

About

Instructor: José M. Vidal
   Homepage: http://jmvidal.cse.sc.edu
   Office: SWGN 3A51
Class Homepage: http://www.csce242.com
Meeting Time: MW 9:05--9:55am. Swearingen 2A27.
Textbook: Recommended books as well as gotapi.com.

This class will cover the development of web applications. We cover all the basic technologies necessary for building web applications as well as new technologies and trends which will used by web application developers in the next decade.

We define web applications as programs whose execution is divided between the web browser (client) and the web server. The client-side is often developed in Javascript while server-side implementations use many different programming languages. Sample web applications include gmail and google maps.

This is an introductory class and no previous knowledge of web technologies or programming is assumed. This class is a pre-requisite for the more advanced CSCE 590: Web applications class. The topics covered are:

1. HTTP, HTML, XHTML, CSS
2. Javascript: DOM manipulation, XML, JSON, DHTML, AJAX
3. Javascript libraries: scriptaculous, jquery, yui
4. Web application frameworks: Google app engine, Django, Ruby on Rails
5. Cloud computing: map reduce, hadoop, Amazon's EC2 and S3
6. Web services and mashups, REST programming
7. Web applications for the iphone and other mobile devices

No Lectures

Instead of having in-class lectures I have decided to create screencasts of a few of my lectures which you will be responsible for watching. I will also supplement these with other online lectures on by experts on the field. After all, why should you listen to me talk about the birth of the web when you can listen to Tim Berners-Lee instead? There will be in-class quizes to verify that you have seen the lectures and performed the reading for that week. Since we have no lectures, class time will instead be taken up by these quizes and more hands-on exercises, which are also part of your grade, as well as one-on-one help from me. I hope this will provide you with a more personalized experience, and that you will learn faster this way. Because, there is a lot to learn!