This is the best book I have found for Freshman/Sophomore-level HTML and JavaScript. I use it with PERL and CGI for the World Wide Web (2nd Edition) by Elizabeth Castro for a complete Sophomore course in designing Commercial-Quality websites with server-side processing. Hint: Be sure to get the Second Printing (First Edition), as there are a lot of typos in the HTML section of the First Printing. The author has an excellent support website at cknuckles.com, which augments some of the problems and provides solutions to some of the exercises.

Can anyone tell me what the website is for this book's lessons. It references it many times but I cant seem to find out where it is actually "Stated" in the book.

Thanks in advance

if u already know something about setting up web pages using html and u wish to add some interactive features to yr web pages,this will be a very good book to start with.This book contains very clear and simple explantions for javascripts.Many concepts are explained using simple yet relevant analogies....if u are hardworking enough u can learn good javascripts in one or two weeks using this book......definitely value for money.

I haven't read the book, but I find it suspious that every review posted so far was outrageously positive, and posted within an 8 day period. In addition, most of them are anonymous. Perhaps the Publisher or Author is trying to boost sales with duplicate reviews. Buyer Beware.

Before reading this book I had no idea how to use the internet, let alone design a web page. However, this book is written on a level that even the most computer illiterate person, such as my self, could follow and understand. Now I can develop interactive web pages that almost look professional. I strongly recomend this book to any one how wants to learn internet programming.

Broad book, covers a little html, a little CSS, a little javascript - RSS, XML, MySQL etc. A lot of functional and usefull PHP hacks.

If you've worked with PHP for a while, you probably already know some of the hacks in this book - I did. But it did give me several ideas and I definitely picked up some new tricks and tips from it, so it was worth the buy for me. I love the "hack" books - I always learn something new!

When trying to figure out how to implement something, do you ever wish that the examples you find would just 'cut to the chase'? ... skip the theory & just show me a rough idea of how to go about it?

This book contains 100 hacks/recipes, satisfying the above need. Each is 2- 3 pages, which can (mostly) be run right from their folder (~100 folders in the downloaded code samples, of course). A hack-folderName cross-refernece would have been nice, but, hey ...

They put you on the track in moments - no need to read the whole book for any hack/recipe - just jump right in (to the problem of your day) ... and you can modify/enhance, as your needs dictate.

Code documentation is non-existent and explanation is sparse; but, they do, indeed, satisfy the need for quick examples in 2 - 3 pages!

`lovin it! NICE format ...

It's very packed full of php solutions that, instead of having you thinking: "I might need this particularly obscure thing later, but then again probably not", like a lot of other books, you'll very likely consider getting a lot of use out of at least 75% of the "hack" recipes eventually.

They're not really hacks by the way, in the negative sense of the word. (Maybe the Recipes book came out first and "Hacks" was the next best word for the title, who knows). But these hack/tips are based on fundamental technologies such as reading/writing XML, preventing double submission on ecommerce sites, making use of design patterns in PHP, great UI tips ( I immediately put one of them to use, which had a url to a popular dhtml library I didn't even know of).

A major portion of the hacks involve excellent user interface advice such as dhtml menus, generating images, etc..

Excellent real-world MySQL tips that include a basic login system, or a PHP recipe that you can use over and over to auto-generate sql CRUD (create/read/update/delete) PHP code. And the other way around. Auto-create mysql code from xml files that contain the schema for the tables.

Also recipes that involve basic knowledge in adding a paypal buy button, php unit testing, testing with simulated users. I shouldn't even attempt at trying to be specific with the types of tips. There are so many of them, varying through different levels of categories

I'd consider it a must-have for all PHP coders. And the reason why I say this, is it's very likely that you will find value in your situation, in at least 2 or 3 of the included "hacks", that would easily cancel out the price of the book. But that's a worst case scenario

The hacks (PHP scripts) may be good ones, but who is this book for?

If you need to learn PHP, get a tutorial book. There are several. This is NOT one. Strangely, it walks you through installing PHP as if you were a beginner, but then it dives right into the hacks with no real discussion of the language. And there are no details about the lines of script within each hack -- you're essentially being asked to take each hack as a wonderful black box from on high.

If you already know PHP pretty well, then you know you can find nearly an infinite supply of great scripts for free on the web (for example, at PEAR, the PHP Extension and Application Repository). Many of them are updated based on feedback and have detailed explanations and discussions to go along with them. Why pay for a small sampling from a book?

And if you're a PHP programmer and want a reference book for looking things up quickly, well, this certainly isn't THAT either.

So I'm again left wondering, who does that leave?

(Edit: I think O'Reilly is a great book company. I own several other O'Reilly books, recommend them highly, and use them all the time. I just have reservations about this particular book's value given that PEAR is free, has user feedback, and is constantly updated.)

Are you a web developer and designer? If you are, then this book is for you! Author Doug Addison, has done an outstanding job of writing a book about building web sites that people will visit, use, bookmark, and revisit.

Addison, begins by untangling the choices that confront web site builders during the process of getting a new web site off the ground. Then, the author discusses site planning and setup. Next, the author presented solutions that will help you balance aesthetics with usability. The author then focuses on the written content that, for the majority of sites, constitutes the meat and potatoes of their online offerings. He continues by covering a few of the most common issues surrounding the use of graphics on a web site, including how to choose the right ones and optimize them for a fast download. Then, the author looks at some techniques for using visual clues. He then goes over some of the little details that make a web site visit successful and enjoyable. Next, the author explains the trust-building techniques and fraud-avoidance maneuvers that help secure both sides in an online transaction. Finally, he discusses both the administrative tasks you should use to maintain your site, as well as the technical procedures you'll need to know to keep your site and your job trouble free.

In this most excellent book you'll find solutions to everything from choosing, registering, and protecting a site's domain name to keep spammers from harvesting the addresses you display on its pages. More importantly, this book can lead the way in showing you how to publish a site that is not only a useful and attractive representation of the business, organization, or person behind it, but is also easy to build, maintain, and update.

Doug Addison has produced a very useful and informative guide to working on Web sites. While many books look at the mechanics of HTML, or detailed coding, Web Site Cookbook rather follows the O'Reilly cookbook structure, looking at specific issues and needs and presenting answers. The book looks at the other aspects of good Web site work - colors, design and small tasks that are part of everyday Web sites now. Many of the recipes will make a more experienced Web site author go "duh," but I found myself flagging many of the entries if nothing else to do more research using some of the Web resources cited at the end of each recipe. Much of what is talked about is Web Design 101, but with so many WYSIWYG tools out there allowing anyone to produce a simple Web site, it's useful to have someone succinctly state the ideas behind complimentary colors to try and avoid those awful sites that just make your eyes burn. Nothing here is earth shattering or is something that you couldn't find on-line, but the value is Addison's organization and presentation, distilling Web speak into simple language, showing some examples and sending the reader off to other resources if he or she wants. The book is written with the idea that you are programming in PHP on top of an Apache Web server, which may not be relevant to all readers, but even those readers, like myself, who don't use PHP or Apache can carry away quick and valuable information, and have a flagged book to grab and look for information on a specific topic in the future. It's going to be a useful addition to my my desk.

I skimmed through the book, and I know I will find it very useful. It points out many things that web developers will want or need to do at some point and provides easy information on how to make them happen.

The one issue I have with the book is that it is about 70% PHP and Apache Server, which I don't use. This isn't a problem with the book, I just didn't quite realize this when I bought it. But, regardless of the language you use to program, even the PHP examples are useful as they show you the methodology to implement solutions in a clear, concise, and easy to understand way. It is also a good reference if you're considering using PHP or use it a little bit.

I have purchased hundreds of technical books, but I never purchased an O'Reilly book before - they just seemed to be too sparse, where I was looking for more in-depth instruction. However, now I know why they are so popular. I think you can learn more from a good example...or a good solution to a problem...rather than reading many chapters of most other books.

This book is definitely for people with some experience and again, I would just stress that it is mainly a PHP and Apache Server reference.

Web Site Cookbook is a really good problem solving guide for beginner to intermediate web designers. This reference includes hundreds of common questions, how tos, and ways to increase efficiency in a standard problem, solution, discussion, and see also format. Each of these entries also uses snippets of text and often includes illustrations of the result whenever possible. Topics include everything from registering and site planning through formatting text and graphics to making forms and dealing with ecommerce issues.

Web Site Cookbook is set up from simple to more complex concepts so that the reader need not have any previous experience creating a website in order to comprehend and make use of these instructions. Furthermore, the quick and easy access of the problem-solution format of the entries will be particularly helpful to web designers looking for particular solutions, wanting to upgrade their skills, or just wanting to learn a few new techniques to improve their site.

Excellent for beginners, but I would have liked to have gotten more detail. Perhaps that is the trade-off for so broad a subject. This book has answers to alot of questions that beginners (like me) might have. For instance, when I was shopping around for a hosting service for a personal website, features that were common to most hosting plans were cron (a scheduling utility) and ssi (server side includes). What are they? Why would they list them as a plus for hosting? Why would I care if they featured these or not? Well the Web Site Cookbook not only tells you what they are, but also gives you examples as to when, how, and why you might use them.

Each topic (recipe) is broken down into 4 sections:
1. Problem: A one or two sentence description of what you need or want to do.

2. Solution: A step by step solution.

3. Discussion: A discussion of the applied solution.

4. See Also: Additional information from other "recipes" in the book and/or outside resources.

There are also sections on planning your site, organizing directories, creating color schemes, as well as tips on making URL's easy to find and remember. (just to name a few). This book will get you well on your way to putting together a well designed web site. Highly recommended.

Once you get past the muddled first chapter, this book provides a good treatment of XSLT. However, it is in bad need of a technical editor, as there are numerous errors of the kind not caught by a spell or grammar checker.

This book, as the author himself put it, provides "task-oriented explanations of how to get work done with XSLT". I would define the audience that will benefit most as intermediate XSLT developers - you are expected to have some knowledge of XML and XSLT. Part 1 has a brief tutorial, yet too brief for a complete novice. Part 2 is what makes this book worth reading - it delves into typical tasks XSLT developers encounter: adding, changing, deleting elements and attributes, sorting, avoiding duplicates and many other. Perhaps, the book was planned as a "cookbook" to quickly look up "how do I...", but it is more than that: the author describes how things work in detail, shows the best way to perform a task, warns about subtle issues you would spend hours fighting with on your own. I found the explanations very useful: even reading about basic concepts can bring discoveries. There are more advanced topics too, like dealing with namespaces or recursive techniques; read about them, and more challenging tasks will not catch you unprepared.

The book doesn't touch on really advanced concepts like the famous Muenchian grouping, but this is probably outside of XSLT's everyday repertoire and, therefore, outside of this book's mission.

I found myself referring to this book often in JavaRanch's XML forum. Just recently when solving RSS namespace mystery, I posted a part of the stylesheet that prints namespaces (p.99) and here is the response: "That diagnostic transform is worth its weight in gold!"

And I am neither the author nor a member of his family.

This is a great book. It hurts to see some people reveiew it with such real... venomous dislike. I suspect it's a style thing--if you're looking for a dictionary-like exhaustive reference, maybe this book isn't for you. Having said that, I have a low tolerance for lots of verbiage, yet DuCharme's book was totally clear to me. I can poke around in it and find what I want so easily. It is very well organized, and well indexed. It serves as an excellent overview of XSLT, and gets pretty advanced, too. This is a great book.

The books title sums it up. Need to do XSLT now? Go to chapter one, page 8 and you are up and running. This book is for the individual that has to code with a deadline. The pace of the book is perfect. An example is given that is straight forward, clear and explained throughly. Then on to the next example which will introduce another XSLT template with another explaination. Fortunately, the author, Mr. DuCharme, rarely spends time on obsecure points or has long discussions on advanced topics that only guru types care about. If you are just getting started,or you are an intermediate user, this is the one. Get it - Quickly.

I was faced with a very short deadline for transforming an XML document into another XML document with a completely different format. I went through several web tutorials and was also trying to learn from Michael Kay's "XSLT" but I was struggling to get productive. With XSLT Quickly I finally started to understand XSLT and did successfully meet my deadline. I find Bob Ducharme's explanations much clearer and easier to understand than any other book on XSLT. If you need to get productive quickly, buy this book.

Once you feel comfortable with XSLT, use Michael Kay's book for reference and advanced topics.

This book is pretty much "THE" manual for anyone that has anything to do with Web development. I've been a professional developer since '96, and of all the technical manuals I have and regularly refer to, this it the one I use the most. Often, I'll be in the middle of coding and my mind blanks out. I grab the book, look in the index, and go right to the section I need. Usually, I'll find just what I needed and slap my forhead in a 'duh' moment, but Mastering HTML saved the day, and that's ok by me!

I bought this book knowing very little about HTML and this was definitely the book for me. It was easy to follow and enjoyable to read - the examples really work and are useful in the "real world". I admire the quality of this book; I got the feeling that time was spent ensuring the accuracy of every detail printed. After reading this book and doing all the exercises I was able to work with my company's Intranet system and this book has been and still is a useful reference guide.

This book is everything it promises to be and more - I highly recommend it.

If you can't find what you are looking for or learn HTML from this book, then there is no hope. This is the most comprehensive HTML book I have ever seen! Well worth the money and time to read it! Covers everything from basic HTML to the most advanced of HTML. The CD included in a fantastic plus, easy to understand and great clear samples.

This is the most comprehensive HTML code book I've read. It not only does a bang-up job of HTML, but it provides references for CSS, Java, Javascript, and Netscape & Microsoft proprietary code as well!

I highly recommend this book to advanced HTML coders and Web Authors. It addresses many complex topics that will benefit the seasoned coders. I don't recommend it to first time HTML authors or WYSIWYG HTML writers.

I purchased this book knowing very little about HTML. While it is a handy desk reference, I found that the free HTML tutorials available online at WebMonkey and Webdeveloper actually explained how to develop tables and stylesheets much better then Mastering HTML 4.0 did.

As a previous review states, it touches on JavaScript, but The JavaScript Source is a free online resource that contains much more information then this book does.

In my opinion, there is no sense spending money on a book when all of the information is available for free on the Internet...learn from my mistake!

This is not your typical clunker with endless pages of filler material. It gets right to the point. If you want to learn about using Perl to interact with the internet, this would be a good book to help you get there. I have purchased several Perl books that supposedly teach you how to write code for use with the internet, but they are difficult to understand, and most of the examples just don't work. This book is an exception to that trend. It is the only one I have found so far that has useable, workable examples. The subject matter is still challenging, but Burke is able to explain it enough to give you a clue. If you are looking for help in handling HTTP programmatically, then here is your book.

I bought this book to get information automatically on japanese stocks(for example, charts, price, volume, PER, PBR, ROE, ROA, News, messages on Yahoo! Japan BBS for stocks) from the WEB every day.

Somehow this book has not yet translated into Japanese language.
I think this book would sell very well if translated into Japanese. Many demands.

This book is self-contained about the WEB, so you need little Perl programming rules and don't have to have knowledge on the Internet Protocols(HTTP) at all.

In most cases, all you need to do is to modify an example program on this book for your use very little.

I really don't know how the previous 5 reviews gave this book 5 stars. I was really excited about this book when I first read the reviews, and now here I am only a few chapters in and already thinking about dumping it altogether. This book has so many flaws for its size, the biggest of which was the codes. I am no Perl expert, but could find my way around in a decent size program. However, no examples I have tried so far in the book actually worked, and some of these are just 10-20 lines long. I am completely new to LWP, I guess like anyone who would buy this book, so it's hard for me to see what the author is doing. The explanation of the code didn't help much either. As oppose to explaining the steps, he just said "the code below does this". And it's pretty obvious little or no editing has gone into this book. If you do buy this book, you'll probably want to make a trip to the Errata page at the Oreilly website. The amount of typos, printing errors, warnings and grammatical mistakes found by readers and editors listed on this page rivals the usuable content of the book itself. You know what, I have spent way too much on this book already.....

If you aren't yet comfortable using object-oriented Perl modules, the multitude of examples will at least allow you see how it's done even if you're a bit fuzzy on what's happening 'underneath' when you call object methods. If you're comfortable learning how to do something without knowing exactly why it works, then the author's clear step-by-step explantions and numerous progressively more powerful examples should make this book accessible even to relatively innexperienced Perl programmers.

More experienced programmers will understand better why things work, but any Perl programmer will set this book down feeling empowered to turn the web into their own valet. No longer do you need to check multiple sites looking for interesting information. Instead, you can readily author code to do that for you and alert you when items of interest are found. You can use these tools to free up personal time, to harvest information to inform business decisions, to automate tedious web application testing, and a zillion other things.

The author's clear exploration of the relevant Perl modules leaves the reader with a good depth of understanding of what these modules do, when you might want to use which module, and how to use them for real world tasks. Before reading the book, I knew of these modules, but they were a rather intimidating pile. I'd used a few of them on occasion for rather limited projects, but was reluctant to invest the time required to read all of the documentation from the whole collection. Mountains of method-level documentation do not a tutorial make. This book takes all of that information, selects the most important parts, and ensures that those parts are covered in progressively more powerful and/or flexible examples.

If you know Perl and you're sick of 'working the web' to get information and you want the web to work for you instead, then you need this book. I had a personal project that was on the back burner for a couple of years because it just sounded too hard. The weekend after I finished this book, I wrote what I had previously thought to be the hard part of that project and it was both easy and fun. This book makes hard things not just possible, but actually easy.

-matt

If you are unfamiliar with LWP and web scraping, or HTML parsing using tokens and trees, I strongly recommend this book. It's the best *introduction* to these topics I've been able to find. Sean's style is clear and concise-just what I expect from an O'Reilly book.

To get the most out of this book, you'll want to be familiar with Object Oriented programming in Perl, because (with the exception of LWP::Simple) all the modules discussed in this book use objects.

Also, don't expect the LWP sample code in the book to work correctly. Many of the sites that the scripts try to "scrape" have changed their layout since this book was published, braking the scripts. This isn't a problem though, because the samples Sean provides are very short and clear, so it's not necessary to run them in order to figure out how they work.

Great book, if you want to learn HTML - it will teach you. Simple to understand, step by step.

I really enjoyed this book, and would definitely recommend it to anyone I know who wants to learn (X)HTML, and basic CSS, I read this in a few weeks, did most of the examples, and found myself feeling sad when the book ended. I wish all technical books were written like this, I would definitely buy other books by Michael Morrison or Dick Oliver again.

I thought it would be so much harder to learn HTML, but with this book, it was relatively painless. This book, and the knowledge it has helped me to attain, has left me interested in learning more about XHTML, CSS, and possibly some programming.
This book is definitely for beginners, I don't know how useful it would be for someone with a knowledge of XHTML, and I'm pretty sure that it wouldn't be useful to someone who already knows some CSS, since it really just touches on style sheets. But, as I said, it is a perfect book for beginners.

Sams Teach Yourself HTML and CSS in 24 Hours has not only refreshed me on the ins and outs of XHTML but also given me a great introduction to CSS and how it works and is put to good use.

If you are looking to start making web pages with HTML and CSS this is definitly the first place you should look. The book dips first into the basics of XTHML (and HTML -- basically the same thing.)Later, it moves to Cascading Style Sheets and really educates you on how they can be used effectively and efficiently, without overdoing it super quick.

If you are new to web design, this book is for you.

Buy this book!!!!!

As usual, I needed some additional infomation and I turned to Sams Teach Yourself books for the assistance I needed. Thank you for a good intro for HTML and CSS. It was just what I needed at just the right time. Thanks again.

As an IT professional that has built and maintained personal web sites for several years, I decided I needed to better understand what I was doing. I have used Front page for years to build the basic structure of my web pages, then venturing into the HTML to modify and add functionality. I never have taken a class or read any other books on HTML, if I got stuck, I would do a search and find a solution. Before purchasing this book I would not say I was a beginner, but I also knew my skill level was not that of an expert.

Authors of how to books must decided who they are writing for. In this case the authors chose to write to beginners, a category I don't personally fit neatly into. Each chapter is about twenty pages long and includes Q&A, quiz, and exercise sections. Each hour is intended to take an hour to read and complete the quizzes and exercises. However since I am not a beginner I find many sections require much less time. I don't feed the need to practice inserting an image onto a page when I already can accomplish the task.

But if I can already do the task, why read the hour? Well for starters, I'm not skillful enough to assume I know anything beyond the basics. Not only that, this book is teaching XHTML when and where it can. I may know how to insert an image, but making the code XHTML compliant is not something I was previously aware of. Not only can I add an image, but now I can easily explain the whys and hows to others if they should ask.

As I progressed through the hours, the subjects got more complex. Even so the chapters where presented and the subjects explained in an easy to understand manner. Each progressive hour builds on the previous ones, however if I wanted to, I could skip ahead to a different chapter and still be able to understand the lesson.

If you are a total beginner to HTML and CSS, this is the book to get. If you are not quite a beginner like I was, this book will take you to the next level. If you are an expert looking to brush up on your skills, look elsewhere. An expert may learn a thing or two from this book, but it is clearly not written for experts. As for me, I have no doubt this book has helped be become a better web master.

PROS:
Very well written and structured in a way that promotes learning
In-depth discussions of CSS
Thorough list of subject matter
Worth every cent I paid and then some
Improved my skill level

CONS:
I didn't get this book sooner

I'm a developer with a degree in CS and 10 years' experience. I bought this book for an SQL Server 2000 project, because I've got more experience with mysql which has slightly different syntax and doesn't support stored procedures.

I guess I just assumed this book would contain query syntax reference. But it doesn't. It is very thorough on stored procedures and xml and I'm sure I will be glad I have it.

But-
If you don't already have one, you will still need to get a query syntax reference.

My choice of this book was based on the reviews written here. After reading the book i wonder if the reviewers actually read the book. It is presented as book that should supply the reader with essential skills on programming stored procedures and using the ms sql 2000 server for XML output and .NET platform integration. But it is nothing more then a purely written book, that has more to say about visual inter Dev then visual studio.net ore visul studio 2003. Beside that it also describes avanced topics in general terms of no use to the developer, that wants to get the job done propperly. This is evident to everybody that actually read the book: As the subjects get more interesting - and complicated- the examples grows rapidly while the explainations scrimp to af few lines. The writter also left out basic commands as 'ref' and 'out' on parameters, which makes me wonder what else he left out. He also tries to give idees on how to develop in a distributed environment, but leaves out every important pitfall, that one has to be aware of in a multi processor environment. I cant imagine a distributed system where where every db runs on a server with only one processor - the system will be way to expensive, read your db lincences and you will know why. All togehter i got the impression that the writter pieced the book together from readings that didn't give him the sufficient knowledge to complete this book in a propper way. It is a waste of my time and money.

I'am sorry about my english - I'am in a hurry and pissed off.

Extremely helpful for SQL/XML. Great examples. Very simple to understand. Author has an interative way of writing. Last 4 chapters are a must read for any SQL developer.

-as read by Mike Tazelaar

This is an informative and comprehensive book.
There are many realistic examples and suggestions that help solve complex and everyday SQL problems quickly.

This book supplies everything that you need for stored procedure development - from naming conventions to methods to deploy changes in production.
Additional software to help with code management is also available on author's web site.

Several ways to accomplish a given task are described, with pro's and con's for each. Sunderic includes not only "how", but "why and why not".

This book contains not only stored procedures, but triggers, user-defined functions, XML and more.

If you write or maintain apps that use SQL Server or train people to do this, this book is a "must have"!

It bothers me that many of the best books on the latest Microsoft technology (.Net, SQL Server) are written by non-native-English speakers. I am amazed by the quality of writing by Francesco Balena and Dino Esposito, and now I would add Dejan Sunderic to my list of favorite authors.

This book is beautifully lucid, broad in scope, and thorough. If you need access to an intelligent treatment of Transact-SQL in its various applications (stored procedures, triggers, XML, etc.), you should seriously consider this book. Your money and time would be well spent!

Trying to create, maintain or understand how a web site works requires having knowledge of many different technologies. This book provides a good overview of the core web technologies (HTML, CSS and JavaScript) and a reference of all elements of these languages. For each element, you will find
- a description
- its syntax
- a practical example
- compatibility with different Explorer and Netscape browser

This makes more than 1100 pages that are easy to consult as a single source for web site programming.

I bought the book 3 years ago and it is the most used book in my library. Excellent reference on HTML, CSS, and JavaScript all cross-referenced, defined, and taged for browser compatibility. Anyone who gets into manual coding should find this an invaluable must-have addition to their library. I can't even begin to think of how much on-line search time this book has saved me when trying to track down the syntax for a rarely used item.

Take the book title to heart -- this is really a reference book, not a comprehensive tutorial on web programming.

The book arrived in a short amount of time and packed well and in good shape. I'm sure the contents must be good as our son-in-law seems to really use it.
Barbara

The Web Programmer's Desk Reference is like a dictionary for a web programmer. Whenever I need to know what attributes an HTML tag has and how those attributes can be set I turn to it. Same for setting selectors in style sheets or using Javascript functions.

Good reference with advanced CSS and Javascript coverage. HTML coverage is good as well, but less thorough on cross platform support details. Also the HTML is HTML and not XHTML which you would probably be using with the latest and greatest CSS and Javascript.

There seems to be no maintained errata for the book which has a pretty bad error on page 7. Contextual selectors like:
h1 em ul { color: red; }

apply to an h1 tag that contains an em tag that contains a ul tag.

text

And not what the book states which is that it is equivalent to:

h1 { color: red; }
em { color: red; }
ul { color: red; }

The code equivalent to the three separate rules is not a contextual select, but just three separate rules that can be written as:
h1, em, ul { color: red; }

Despite this error early on in the book, I find it overall a useful reference.

The author's unmaintained website is at:
http://deskref.softsmartinc.com

If you know HTML, you already know everything in this book. If you don't know HTML, you won't learn it from this book. It's much too simplistic. It also encourages copying pictures and code from other websites.
It's really something I'd expect to see posted for free on the internet--that's the level of writing & information. And at least the links would be updated online.
As a beginner's book for a child, it might be okay, but for an adult or anyone with experience, it's not worth reading.

I bought this book for my 12 year old son and he actually enjoyed reading it. He has been creating web pages ever since. He is now the Web Master at his middle school and is responsible for their web page. I hope Dave writes some more computer related books for kids/teenagers to keep their interests up.

I recently came across this book while trying to find information about designing my own website. Most of the books I found were written in a manner that made me want to forget the whole idea of being a webmaster. But that all changed when I came across THIS book. I could not believe how simple reading it was and encourageable! My hope was re-ignited. The best part of the book was being able to actually go online and pull up David's website which the book used as example. The book is full of helpful information and resources that it saves the reader time in the long run once they are ready to publish their own page. It even saves money. I was to the point of going out and buying expensive programs until reading this book. I didn't have to! I even had a few questions regarding my page and emailed David. He personally replied within 24 hours and graciously offered me my answers.

The next amazing thing about this book is the author's age! For a teenager, he is brilliant. He is the next Bill Gates!

I HIGHLY recommend this book to anyone wanting to tackle the feat of webpage design and have been frightened off by other books. I am in my early 30s and don't mind being taught by a teenager.

This book is a great book for beginners programming their first webpage, or, for that matter, programming a webpage at all. It skips most of the technical mumbo-jumbo that would confuse most people and cuts it down to what it needs to make a great webpage. This is one of the best books out there for beginners and pros alike.

Hi, my name is Arthur Wegelin and I am taking this moment to tell you about what I say is the greatest book that anyone can ever read about web design. Since I go to the same school as Dave I was able to ask him right away if I could have a copy of his book. When I received the book, I started studying it page by page to get all the information for my website. After thoroughly studying the book I was amazed at the possibilities. Dave's book does not only talk about designing the webpage itself but it also tells you where you can get: great software tools, free server space, free web gadgets, free e-mail and lots of other stuff. I'll admit I haven't really taken the time to read any other books about HTML, but if I'm asked by someone which book I would recommend for web design it would be Dave's book and only Dave's book.