Tag: javascript

TPDP Episode #9: An Ember In The Land Of Web Frameworks

September 3, 2016

We’re nearing the end of 2016 and there are many JavaScript frameworks available to choose from, with more on the way. Each framework offers a unique perspective of front-end development that can be very attractive to solo developers or development teams. This brings us to a very popular JavaScript framework called Ember.js. In this episode of The Polyglot Developer Podcast, I have guest speakers Tracy Lee and Taras Mankovski, who are both Ember experts.

Tracy Lee is a very successful JavaScript developer who sold her start-up and now focuses on her web organization Modern Web, which educates people on different development technologies. Taras Mankovski runs a very popular consulting business called Ember Sherpa which also educates businesses on the Ember.js framework. In the ninth episode of this podcast, An Ember in the Land of Web Frameworks, we explore Ember and the conveniences it offers in the realm of JavaScript and front-end development. This exploration includes tooling and comparisons against other popular frameworks like React and Angular.

August 22, 2016

Nic Raboy

By now you’re probably aware that I’m all about Amazon Alexa skills since I’m a proud owner of an Amazon Echo. I had released a Alexa skill called BART Control and published a guide on creating a simple skill with Node.js and Lambda. If you went through my Node.js and Lambda guide you probably found it pretty painful to test the skill you were working on. The constant building and uploading to Lambda could easily get out of control. What if I told you there was a much simpler way that could save you a ton of time?

We’re going to take a look at adding test cases for testing an Alexa skill offline without ever having to upload the skill to Lambda.

August 13, 2016

Nic Raboy

When it comes to modern JavaScript development, there are a few different ways to handle asynchronous events or data. You could use promises and callbacks, but as great as they are, present certain limitations. This is where RxJS comes into play with its reactive programming model. In this episode of The Polyglot Developer Podcast, guest speaker Ben Lesh and I discuss RxJS and where it fits in modern JavaScript development, whether it be server-side or front-end.

Ben Lesh is a senior software engineer at the very popular entertainment streaming company, Netflix. One of Ben’s projects at Netflix includes the development and maintenance of RxJS since it is heavily used by the company. In the eighth episode, Asynchronous and Event-Based Programming with RxJS we discuss everything from what is RxJS, how it was inspired, who is using it, and why you should use it over a few of the alternative methods. If you’ve ever heard of RxJava or Rx.NET, these projects share some similarities to RxJS.

August 12, 2016

Nic Raboy

Recently I published my first skill for Amazon’s Alexa voice service called, BART Control. This skill used a variety of technologies and public APIs to become useful. In specific, I developed the skill with Node.js and the AWS Lambda service. However, what I mentioned is only a high level of what was done to make the Amazon Alexa skill possible. What must be done to get a functional skill that works on Amazon Alexa powered devices?

We’re going to see how to create a simple Amazon Alexa skill using Node.js and Lambda that works on various Alexa powered devices such as the Amazon Echo.

July 13, 2016

Nic Raboy

I am pleased to announce that my first ever skill for Amazon Alexa powered devices has gone live in the Amazon Skill Marketplace. My skill, BART Control, accesses live information about the Bay Area Rapid Transit system in northern California.

If you’re unfamiliar with Amazon Alexa, it can be described as follows per Amazon:

Alexa, the voice service that powers Echo, provides capabilities, or skills, that enable customers to interact with devices in a more intuitive way using voice. Examples of these skills include the ability to play music, answer general questions, set an alarm or timer and more. Alexa is built in the cloud, so it is always getting smarter. The more customers use Alexa, the more she adapts to speech patterns, vocabulary, and personal preferences.

I personally own an Amazon Echo, but there is a wide variety of hardware that is compatible with Amazon’s voice service.

Now let me share some specifics about the skill that I developed and what I used to develop it.

July 6, 2016

Nic Raboy

In my previous NativeScript tutorials I demonstrated how to access native platform APIs and features using JavaScript, but I never explained how to develop plugins that could accomplish this in a very maintainable fashion. By moving this native functionality to plugins, the application code remains a lot cleaner and is better for the long run.

For reference, you can see how to create Toast notifications in Android and determine the application version in Android and iOS using my previous tutorials.

This time we’re going to look at bundling that functionality into a plugin.

May 11, 2016

Nic Raboy

There are a lot of different ways to develop mobile applications. On my first two podcast episodes I discussed some of these app development solutions, but this time I’m doing a followup on one in particular. In this episode of The Polyglot Developer Podcast, guest speaker TJ VanToll and I are going to take a deeper look at Telerik NativeScript, who should be using it, and what separates it from the other frameworks that exist.

TJ VanToll is a Developer Advocate for Telerik and is working on making the NativeScript framework a success for developers and enterprises. In Episode #5: Developing Mobile Apps with Telerik NativeScript, we’re going to cover everything that can be covered without actually looking at code. I ask TJ questions that I often receive on my blog as well as at events.

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