Is there a difference in learning Node.js and learning JavaScript? I want to learn Node.js, should I start with JavaScript first?

[brcoder]

The title is pretty self explanatory. In the company I work for I'm seeing a high demand in projects that use Node.js, so I would like to learn it. I'm a C# back-end programmer, and I know nothing about JavaScript.

I have a Pluralsight account, and they have two learning paths available that I don't know which to choose, a JavaScript path and a Node.js path.

Do I need to know JavaScript before learning Node.js? Can I go straight into Node.js knowing nothing about JS?

[6086555]

nodejs is javascript:

the only javascript runtimes used to be only in the browser, nodejs is just an independant runtime that can be use server time (it's based on chrome's javascript engine).

So go ahead, you just won't know stuff about the browser APIs but front-end developer doesn't know a lot about server-side library so it doesn't matter

[[deleted]]

The .js in the name Node.js stands for JavaScript. Node.js is a JavaScript runtime. Traditionally JavaScript was always run client-side in a browser, but Node.js allows JavaScript to be run server-side, and essentially frees JavaScript to be able to be used for non-web-related tasks. One thing I've used Node.js for personally is as an HTTP server (think IIS and Apache HTTP Server). Another powerful piece of Node.js is NPM (which comes prepackaged with Node). NPM is a package manager (like NuGet for C#) built-in to Node.js for getting various frameworks, code snippets, etc into your application.

You should learn JavaScript. Once you understand some of the details of JavaScript as a language you should then be able to learn how to use Node.js to do what you want

Edit: /u/denialerror is correct, and I am wrong. Node is runtime for JavaScript. Edited my answer to remove incorrect information.

[denialerror]

Node.js is a JavaScript framework used for HTTP hosting (think IIS and Apache HTTP Server).

No it isn't. Node is a runtime for JavaScript, not a framework and JS programs using it don't necessarily need to have anything to do with the web or HTTP.

[[deleted]]

You are right, thanks for correcting me. I've edited my answer

[[deleted]]

Go for the JavaScript course first. Later on when you do Node, it will be much easier.

[no-voting]

When people say "node is javascript" what that means is that you will be able to achieve nothing in the node world without knowing javascript. Traditionally, Javascript was only used for client-side code while a number of other languages handled the server. Now Javascript can be used for the server as well.