IQODE Limited

I'm not sure if anyone else agrees but I sometimes find it hard to locate genuinely useful and practical Ext JS samples. Don't get me wrong, the Ext JS API documentation is second to none and provides a superb resource, but sometimes I just want to dig right into an application and see how it's been crafted, what best practices I should be following and how I can create DRY code. And do you know what? I find the Ext JS samples to be a little terse and not so well crafted. I understand it is likely that they are deliberately written this way so as to not bury the point of the sample but it is a time consuming process to digest, merge and/or re-factor the elements and snippets that interest you into a coherent and well written application.

What we need is some kind of reference. a reference that uses these sample elements, morsels and snippets as building blocks. a reference that binds and bakes these building blocks into coherent examples and sample applications.

We need a cookbook. an Ext JS Cookbook!

The Ext JS Cookbook by Jorge Ramon is full of step-by-step recipes to bake up some solid Ext JS code. Early pages in the book tackle some Ext JS and OO JavaScript basics though in no way is Jorge trying to provide a primer for developers. In fact he's simply reviewing the more basic ingredients and methods we'll need in order to better understand the rest of the book. I would have preferred these early pages to be less verbose - these early code samples were overly detailed. I don't need to see the the whole HTML document in the examples. just the important bits, please.

After those early pages, the book soon settles into a nice style that is easy to read. Each recipe is laid out in a way that makes it easy to dip into and quickly find the facts. A typical recipe is comprised of the following sections:

• What You're Going to Achieve.
• How To Do It.
• How It Works.
• There's More.

As the book progresses so does the complexity of the examples and recipes. Jorge takes us through the basics of the Ext JS toolkit and widgets providing some great insight and very very practical and useful sample code. Subsequent examples leverage or reference knowledge from previous chapters so we can quickly see how to combine recipes and techniques to create complex Ext JS applications. Importantly we learn how to engineer these techniques using established design patterns to create truly reusable and flexible code encapsulated as components, custom classes or plug-ins.

The last chapter discusses these design patterns in more detail and is an excellent primer for those interested in extending the Ext JS framework and creating plug-ins, modules and components. Additionally we learn how to enhance our application's performance and our user's experience.

All in all this is a great book and a fantastic resource for any Ext JS developer.