Yearly Archives: 2015

ImmutableJs — Most developers emphasize immutability when dealing with functional programming. Code written in functional style is testable, because the functions operate on data treated as immutable. In practice though, I see this principle violated from time to time. I will present […]

Introduction to Immutable.js

This entry was posted in Javascript Libraries and tagged Functional Programming Javascript JSON NodeJs NPM Tutorial UnderscoreJs on 13th September 2015 by zsolt-nagy

Should I write comments in my code? Should I avoid them at all costs? Should I use them sparingly? When developing software, all developers have their view on how and when to use comments. This article will reflect my opinion, […]

Are JavaScript Comments Useless?

This entry was posted in JavaScript Basics and tagged Automated Testing Functional Programming Javascript Maintainability on 6th September 2015 by zsolt-nagy

You may have heard the advice that maintainable software is build using highly cohesive and loosely coupled building blocks. This is a statement that's easy to remember, but difficult to understand. This article will clarify cohesion and coupling. Cohesion According […]

Understanding Cohesion and Coupling

This entry was posted in Maintainability and tagged Learning Maintainability Software Engineering on 23rd August 2015 by zsolt-nagy

A higher order function is a function whose argument list or return value includes a function. Knowledge about higher order functions is essential when writing programs both in functional and in object oriented style. Why is functional programming good? When […]

Functional and Object Oriented Programming with Higher Order Functions

This entry was posted in JavaScript Basics and tagged Functional Programming Javascript UnderscoreJs on 14th August 2015 by zsolt-nagy

Logging Reference Types — Following the previous post about principles of debugging web applications, it is time to explore JavaScript debugging in practice. Browser Developer Tools My personal favorite is the Chrome Developer Tools. Safari and Firefox don't match the high standards set by […]

JavaScript Debugging Tips and Tricks

This entry was posted in Web Applications and tagged Javascript Maintainability on 9th August 2015 by zsolt-nagy

Firebug — Regardless of our coding skills we all make mistakes. Bugs do not only appear in our own code. Most web-applications are created by teams, and your teammates have the same right to make mistakes as you do. In addition, inheriting […]

Principles of Debugging Web Applications

This entry was posted in Web Applications and tagged Automated Testing Maintainability TDD Unit Testing on 5th August 2015 by zsolt-nagy

JavaScript made its way from being a toy language for simple animations to becoming a language for client side and server side web application development. Some generic concepts also made their way to the JavaScript world and developers become more […]

Cloning Objects in JavaScript

This entry was posted in JavaScript Basics and tagged Functional Programming Javascript JSON Maintainability UnderscoreJs on 25th July 2015 by zsolt-nagy

Reference Types — JavaScript does not give you full access to your data structures in memory. However, reference types still exist in the language. Mixing value and reference types comes with unwanted side-effects and bugs. Understanding the difference between value and reference types […]

Understand Value and Reference Types in JavaScript

This entry was posted in JavaScript Basics and tagged Javascript on 19th July 2015 by zsolt-nagy

Code — Developing and maintaining web applications requires code changes of excellent quality. When a team develops an application for years, team members lose track of some updates. Developers tend to make more mistakes when touching code they are not familiar with. […]

My 8 Step Code Review Process

This entry was posted in Web Applications and tagged Competence Learning Maintainability on 12th July 2015 by zsolt-nagy

Most people work about 40 hours a week, some more, others less. Given that you have 168 hours a week, maximizing your achievements does not scale with maximizing the amount of time spent on work. Instead of focusing on quantity, […]

Ten Productivity Tips for Software Developers

This entry was posted in Productivity and tagged Competence Learning on 5th July 2015 by zsolt-nagy

SinonJs — One of the most powerful features of SinonJs is the ability to create a fake server. This feature is very useful when unit testing a component that's connected to a server via an API. Fake servers let you write real […]

Fake Servers in SinonJs

This entry was posted in Test Automation and tagged Automated Testing BackboneJs ChaiJs Javascript JSON Maintainability Mocha SinonJs Unit Testing on 26th June 2015 by zsolt-nagy

BackboneJs — Writing maintainable code is not easy in any frameworks or libraries. The fact that BackboneJs does not tie your hands makes your work even harder. Therefore, I will give you ten tips on tidying up your Backbone code. While some […]

Ten Tips for Writing Maintainable Code in BackboneJs

This entry was posted in Web Applications and tagged BackboneJs Javascript JSON Maintainability MarionetteJs UnderscoreJs on 20th June 2015 by zsolt-nagy

SinonJs — Tests suites tend to grow together with applications. It is quite common that you need a significant amount of time to execute all your unit tests. Under these circumstances, you cannot afford to waste 5 secons on waiting for a […]

Fake Timers with SinonJs

This entry was posted in Test Automation and tagged Automated Testing Javascript Mocha SinonJs Unit Testing on 13th June 2015 by zsolt-nagy

SinonJs — This is part 5 of the automating testing series with Mocha, Chai and SinonJs. Part 1 and part 2 introduce the Mocha automated testing framework and the Chai assertion library. We then learned how to use SinonJs spies and stubs. […]

SinonJs Mocks

This entry was posted in Test Automation and tagged Automated Testing BackboneJs Javascript Mocha SinonJs Unit Testing on 5th June 2015 by zsolt-nagy

interview — Hiring good JavaScript application developers is not easy. Whenever the recruitment team sets up a proper funnel, only 5% - 8% of the applicants reach the final interview. If recruiters focus on wrong things, they reject their best candidates. Even […]

The Art of Hiring Great Javascript Developers

This entry was posted in Productivity and tagged Competence Javascript Learning on 31st May 2015 by zsolt-nagy