JavaScript Introduction
This computer science course is an initiation to JavaScript programming and has been designed to help Web developers have an understanding of the basic concepts of the language. This course was developed in partnership between W3C and University Côte d'Azur.
JavaScript lets you add interactive features to your Web sites, including dynamically updated content, controlled multimedia, animated images, and much more.
The main objective of this course is to master JavaScript best practices by means of many interactive examples, some of which are demonstrated in live coding videos.
We’ll use JavaScript within the Web browser. Why JavaScript is worth your time:
- HTML5, CSS and JavaScript are the “classic three” for developers and designers;
- It allows you to add interactivity to your Web sites;
- You can use JavaScript and HTML5 APIs to create custom graphics and animation, and to master multimedia using audio and video players, music and sound effects;
- It is powerful, easy to learn, and quick to write;
- It has great tools (editors, runtimes, lint tools, browsers, and third party libraries) as well as great online support through plenty of active open source communities.
At the end of the course, we expect that you will be able to read the source code of any JavaScript example found on the Web, learn from it, tweak it, and even – why not? – start contributing to open-source JavaScript projects. This introductory course will make you think like a JavaScript developer.
What you'll learn
- How to add JavaScript (JS) code in your Web site/Web app, how to debug it
- How to make interactive Web sites through the DOM API
- How to change the CSS styles of HTML5 elements from JavaScript
- How to deal with HTML5 forms
- How to make basic graphics and animations using the HTML5 canvas
- How to use the basic concepts of ES2016, the last iteration of the language: arrays, functions, loops, basic objects
Module 1: Introduction to JavaScript
- JavaScript, HTML and CSS
- JavaScript overview
- Your first HTML/CSS/JS page
- Variables, values, functions, operators, and expressions
- Simple JavaScript examples to play with
Module 2: Adding interactivity to HTML
- Conditional statements, loops and logical operators
- Functions and callbacks
- Handling events
- The DOM API
- Let's write a small game
Module 3: Playing with HTML5
- APIs Arrays and iterators
- HTML5 multimedia and JavaScript API
- Displaying a map with the Geolocation API
- Playing sound samples and music
Module 4: Structuring data
- Objects, properties and methods
- Creating multiple objects
- Organizing the code in separate files
- Improving the game with ES6 classes
Module 5: Working with forms
- Built-in JavaScript objects
- HTML5 tables, forms and input fields
- The JSON notation
- Let's create a small application
Michel Buffa
Professor
University Côte d’Azur
