Style Sheets Books

This book is a real gem! I read it often just for inspiration. The author is passionate about design, markup, and styling and it rubs off on me. Transcending CSS fills a niche somewhere between the technical manuals and design books. It has had a clear impact on my work.

Transcending CSS is a book that, as it explains in its opening, isn't intended as a basic overview of CSS. It assumes a solid base of knowledge, and if you have that, the book can be extremely beneficial.

That's not to say that the book wouldn't be useful to a novice designer, but they might want to pick it up again after they have more experience with the CSS selectors and attributes Clarke uses.

The book has a lot of material regarding separating layout and style and making semantically correct HTML, which is important for both designers and developers to understand as web pages become more and more feature-rich and stylized. Clarke presents it in an easy-to-understand format, and helps the reader see semantic markup everywhere.

The sections regarding layout and inspiration were very well done, however I felt that more could have been done here. I suppose that it's forgivable since it is a book about CSS and web design rather than design theory, but I found those sections to be the most interesting.

I highly recommend this book to any designer or developer looking to get a better grasp of where web design is going and what constitutes good web design.

This book is amazing in it's holistic approach to web design using CSS. It's from a designer's perspective and helps a lot in the thought process and workflow departments, then shows you a wonderful way to build up a design from the ground up based on a content-out approach. In some ways I wish that I had read it before any other CSS book, but I don't think I would have been able to appreciate it as much that way - it's an advanced book that has great pacing and brings a large number of design concepts all together. It gave me the feeling that I was tying up a lot of loose ends in my personal knowledge base and making it all complete. Great book! *I wouldn't sell my for anything*

I wanted to like this book. If you are new to design, it contains useful sections on page prototyping, grid-based design, color, and design practices. These are things designers should learn about, especially if they arrive in web design from other fields. I give the book three stars for these positive features and for its high production values.

Physically, the book is about two inches wider than a standard programming book. The paper is heavy and coated with full color all over the place. This is nice, but the author goes too far. Some pages include pictures of websites, but many other pages are filled with seemingly random photographs and montage works. In fact, pages 239-242 are fully dedicated to a scrapbook sample. Page 243 includes some text, but 244 is another wasted page. The images are sedate, and these picture pages seem to take up a quarter of the book. White space abounds. Consequently, as others have noted, the book is light on useful information.

I understand the attraction of grids. CSS divs and table cells both lend themselves to grid layouts. I know it is in vogue to emulate the multi-column layouts found in a newspaper page. I've read plenty about usability and how people actually surf. Unfortunately, the author's fixation with these conventions leads to dull page design. The most interesting, useful technique in the whole book involves the intelligent use of relative and absolute positioning to displace background images so that they break up the outlines of the blocks.

On the down side, the author advocates the use of browser-specific style sheets and the use of CSS3 style rules. Current browsers still have problems with some CSS 2.1 rules. The CSS3 rules will be great when browsers support them, but they won't help you write pages that work on multiple browsers and platforms. And that's the real issue with this book. It contains information that is useful to beginners, but it's not really a beginner book. This book won't have you writing CSS and XHTML in a few hours. The strange mixture of beginning and advanced materials mixture may confuse beginners while offering little that is new or useful to more experienced designers. Add in the sheer volume of wasted space and I have only one recommendation: Borrow the book from the library.

First, there are way too many full-page pictures and quotes in this book, which could have been used to provide meaningful content. Second, the author gives a lot of his opinions, and comes off as pretentious. The book's back cover says that you'll be able to "implement highly original designs through visual demonstrations of the creative possibilities using markup and CSS." I disagree, because much of the book is a discourse on Web page-related subjects such perspective, grid-based design, and using a scrapbook for inspiration. A scrapbook! It's doesn't contain a lot of instructions on how to implement CSS, and for the amount that does, it's accounts for about 30% of the book. This book is $49.99. It's a lot of money for a lot of fluff. If you're looking for a hands-on instructional book on CSS, look somewhere else.

It arrived in mint condition within two weeks even though I live in the EU.

Put simply, if you want to play jazz, you need to know the tunes in this book. My guitar teachers have given mixed reviews of some of the arrangements of the tunes, but nonetheless, the Real Book is a must-have for any serious jazz musician.

I am very pleased with The Real Book, 6th edition. It is clearly formatted, the chords are all proper, and the song selection is diverse. This is a great book for newbies to jazz and seasoned six string vets as well. I would not hesitate to recommend it to either.

i really like this book it is essential to all aspiring and accomplished jazz musicians

It is a pleasure to see clearly written notation, so it gets 4 stars, but just barely..

Number 1 complaint:

The publisher did not follow a cardinal rule of notation: don't place vertical bar lines directly below the bar lines of the staff directly above. So many of the songs have ALL the bar lines directly below those above.

This makes it much harder to sight read the music. For example, look at "I'll Remember April". The first two measures for staff 6 are the same as staff 5. If your eyes don't jump down, you will get to the 3rd measure and find yourself replaying staff 5. Compare that to sight reading "Man in the Green Shirt", or "500 Miles High" where most bar lines do not line up directly under the staff above. So much easier to keep your place.

Number 2 complaint:

My number 2 complaint is the material used for the covers. Way too thin, prone to tearing. And the paper is grease/dirt absorbent. It should have a stiffer cover board with a laminate finish.

I bought this book hoping it would be all that I would need to build my sites with cleanly and yet some complexity. I've found that I'm often at the library borrowing many other Dreamweaver 8 titles and finding them much more helpful. I've found finding specific help in this book a bit difficult, and the chapter progression doesn't really make sense. My main background is design and the arts - but I don't think this book is too technical for me... just counter-intuitive in its structure. I much prefer the Sitepoint books so far... even the Dreamweaver for Dummies are at least just as good, and much less expensive. Would not recommend to buy - maybe try it at your library first.

The title says it all. This is an must-have resource when learning Dreamweaver and the authors give you tips, shortcuts, as well as explanations for many of these tips and shortcuts which help you seriously cut through the clutter and get to the point, which is how to get your site up and running! I bought it along with Dreamweaver Hands On Training and I think it a great compliment.

For those who find it hard to follow on line help or tutorials, this is the book for you. The Missing Manual series is very instructive and helpful to those who are just beginning and to those who are well on their way to using Dreamweaver. Commands that you may have forgotten are easy to find in this book. I would recommend it.

I'll keep this short. Starting as a total novice in Dreamweaver this book has taught me pretty much everything I need to know. When ever I get stuck now I can get the answers that I need. Certainly blows the online help from Adobe out of the water. This is a must have book.

This is a very good instruction book for anyone starting out with Dreamweaver. The book is laid out in a very logical manner in seven sections which lead you clearly through the art of creating a web site in Dreamweaver. At nearly a thousand pages it covers a lot of ground but whether you are a novice or have some experience this book will definitely help you create a better web site. For those of you without Dreamweaver or those who want a little more detailed background in web design I recommend [ASIN:0596008422 Creating Web Sites: The Missing Manual]

What a great book. I just could not put this down and read the whole book in 1 day. As a asp.net coder, Css is the last thing I needed to learn to make great looking websites.
Simon explans things clear and complete. I was always a but lost with id and class and what one I should be useing. The way it was expland left me with no questions. I fell CSS is something that you look up when you need to get a result. This book is well layed out to find things fast.
The only thing I fault is that it would be great if the samples were in colour. A must have for beginners to pro.

I bought this book a year ago to get me started in writing CSS web pages. This was just the book I needed to get me started. It is reasonable simple to following along with and experiment with the examples. The outcome of my trek through this book is my personal home page (http://www.intergate.com/~waltwilliams/) which is now so much more presentable and professional looking. I have actually had people ask who I hired to create it. I would recommend this book to anyone who wishes to learn CSS.

If you are just starting out and are looking for direction in web design, buy this book. Even if you already have your feet wet in Web design this book may help you out. Simon Collison did a great job writting on the topic of CSS stylesheets and web design. Its not a lecture book, its a hands on instruction manual that progressively gets you used to working with CSS. It shows you the do's and the donts and Simon is very motivated to keep your attention.

I went through this book a chapter at a time. I kept record of each chapter and worked through all the examples. I learned how to properly format my XHTML and CSS. Did i mention i don't have any real experience in web design. As a beginner it is very difficult to find a book that will give you examples and teach you how to do things. You usually either get a book thats nothing but a lecture on the topic with a miss leading title that says for beginners, or you get a 800 page manual thats more or less like a dictionary, last you may get a quick project that leaves you with no knowledge of the subject but you sure can make a great steriotipical format of a web page.

The book clearly avoids the common door stopper and quick start book. Its not to lengthy and it does a great job implimenting theory behind the code. Simon shows you formats to properly use when developing CSS style sheets, so that your pages look clean and are easily accessible when it comes to trouble shooting or making changes.


Simon Collison also keeps a light base of humor throughout to keep you interested but it isn't overdone to where it just gets in the way of your reading. The book is finished with a Case Study where Simon has you make a page using all the techniques you have learned previously throughout the book. My only con is that there are a few things at the end in the case study that Simon has you do that arn't previosly covered. You may not even notice. (But if you are making a page alligned in the center don't forget to have your containing div's left and right margin be set to auto.)
But, you have to consider the length of the book and the fact that its intended for beginners, you can't include everything or you start to get to lengthy, which i wouldn't have necesarily minded. I'm sure they probably left some stuff out also because, ...they want you to buy the next book in line.

So in conclusion I recomend this book. Even if you don't want to learn the art of CSS and are a dairy cow farmer that dosn't speek english, i still recomend this book!

Beginning CSS Web Development is a great resource for beginners. As long as you already have some HTML knowledge you will easily pick up on CSS concepts. This book is well written, full of examples and outside resources that will keep you busy for days. Before I got this book CSS had always seemed this mysterious complicated code that would take years to learn and I really didn't want to be bothered. This book proved the opposite, CSS is simple and can make your design much more flexible and elegant, your HTML code will look cleaner and organized. It is a lot easier to work with style sheets than HTML alone. I am confident that this book has covered all the basics of CSS. Definitely a book to have at hand.

This book is incomplete! Subjects to quickly covered and many errors between printed copy and downloaded lessons.

Chapter 16 was hurried and confusing and again incomplete.

After saying this I did learn the gist of CSS so not a total loss!

Author knew his stuff - he just seemed to hurry through this book and did not do the job I felt he knew how to do.

I have had limited experience creating web pages. Learning Web Design has made the task so much easier. This book is very clearly written with great examples. I would highly recommend if you are just starting out or looking for a text to use in the classroom.

This is an excellent book if you are a novice looking to learn HTML and CSS.
The book is easy to read and follow, and includes a companion website which has downloadable code examples with which you can practice.
I purchased this book with the intention of using it as an easy CSS reference, but ended up learning some excellent HTML skills, as well.

This is, by far, the most useful and easy-to-read book on web design that I have seen / purchased so far.

I am a programmer by trade, but find it useful to be aware of, if not proficient in, web technologies. I purchased this book because I have been dabbling in web design for a long time now, but never as a primary task. This book is useful as a review of the current web standards and techniques, as well as an introduction for individuals who may be new to the topics discussed therein. The chapters are succinct, providing the reader all the necessary information to become informed without wasting time on details that may be distracting for review or overwhelming for beginners. I highly recommend this book.

This book is a great beginning guide to web design. The book does not overload you and sticks with the basics, but offers you other resources to dive deeper into various topics.

This book also gives you great examples to follow and exercises to do on your own. I found that doing the exercises helped me gain a better understanding of the various web design techniques.

This book has given me a huge head start with xhtml, css, and web graphics. I started with zero understanding of web design and now I have the tools to make a good looking functional website.

I rate this book with 5 stars for being a solid introduction to (X)HTML and CSS and for being clear, easy to follow, and colourful.

I disagree with the previous reviewer BB, who said the book was not for beginners and rated it with one star. He mentions Jennifer N. Robbins uses vocabulary she hasn't defined before. Well, if he's talking about terms like web browser, web server, or link, I might agree with him/her, but hey, those words are common vocabulary words for any Internet user. Perhaps if he had pointed out specific words, I might have said a bit more on his review.

Let me convince you: I'm not a native English speaker and I got the information perfectly well.

It is a shame this book has fallen into 4.5 stars just because of one 1 star rating review informing about problematic issues with no sort of justification or examples proving what the reviewer is complaining about.

In any case, we have to respect his/her opinion, though I didn't take his comments or rating into account when deciding whether to buy the book or not; the book turned out just fine, as I had expected based on the other reviews.

Jennifer Robins has done a great job introducing the reader to virtually all html elements (I guess all, but a professional might notice a few of them are missing).

The contents are colourful as hell, well organised, and they follow a static format scheme that allows for easy readability; the author uses sidebars every now and then to point out key information; the book shows she has a clear mind on how to get a beginner to digest the information presented.

I think the technique she used to introduce us to the different aspects of html/css is just the more appropiate for a starter book. She goes over every aspect, then she writes a sample code about that specific one, and then she shows the resulting page. Once again, she'll colour-code the html code, and then either encase the result in a box, or take a screenshot.

Where I want to get to here is, you aren't going to find a ten pages long html code combining every single element she's gone over and beating the crap out of everyone who tries to read it and point out each section in the resulting html page.

That being said, and bearing in mind the other reviews, I guess nothing else can be said about this great piece of work.

Fantastic, really simple tutorials and suggested websites for further info. Deals with the basics to get an extemely powerful website online.

There are many more aspects to web design but anyone from the total beginner to intermediate should find this book helpful.

Better than Dreamweaver MX 2004 "Training From the Source". This is a step by step book for beginners thru experts. I found it easy to follow and understand. It is also a good reference book for the experienced, which I am not. Why Macromedia could not furnish a book like this with there software I will never understand. The same goes for the new Dreamweaver 8. They want you to buy there product but not show you how to use it. This is a good buy.

So many software books are so confusing and difficult to understand, I really appreciateone that is clear and truly helpful, which this one is.

I have read this book cover to cover. You can read it in front of your computer and perform the tutorials or you can simple read an look at the illustrations. Both provide you with a very accurate experience. The online web site allows you to download all of the necessary files to perform your labs if you desire. It is simple, elegant, and well thought out book. You can't walk away from this book and not say that you did not truely learn to use Dreamweaver MX 2004. I struggled to learn this program, after reading the book, I have built several complex websites, complete with dynamic database integration. This book is that good!

I admit I'm biased because I've had Dave as a teacher and he's a great one, but his book is like his teaching -- clear, comprehensible, practical and most importantly, funny. Who wouldn't want to work on the National Exasperator pages? His tutorials are excellent, easy to use and fun.

This book does its stated purpose very well. Not too indepth, not too shallow. Find a property, check it out, and back to work.

Probably a good reference if you already know CSS.
Not useful if you're learning CSS from scratch.

Developing accessible, standards-based websites that work and look properly on everyone's screen (I'm looking at you, IE) can be a real struggle sometimes, but this book has been a life saver for me. Having the book at my desk and being able to quickly look up this syntax or that modifier is extremely helpful. I can't recommend this book more for anyone who does a lot of web development and is just looking for a quick, to the point reference guide.

You know CSS, but you are not using it every day thus not remember every single attribute and specific syntax for every style there is?

You are like me and you will appreciate this little helper. It is very compact and filled with every CSS 2.0 style there is.

It also shows which properties and styles are compatible with which Browser. It is up to you if you want to use the latest styles available or rather fall back to the styles and properties that virtually every browser in use today can render correctly.

This is a compact reference for CSS and not meant for people who want to learn CSS. It would make a good addition when you buy a book to learn CSS and get this reference for quick look-ups of the already learned styles.

Not as Handy as It Should Be

I liked the Idea of a quick reference for CSS, because I always struggle with remembering the exact syntax (or confuse them with HTML or JS attributes) or can't recall which properties can be applied to which HTML element. I have to problems with this reference, which makes it for me less effective than I wish it to be.

1) This is not and issue with the content, but the page layout. It wouldn't be too hard to print the chapter and the property that can be found on the page at the top of every page to make scanning of the book easier and reduces the need for a detour to the index.

2) It would have been great if there would have been not only a list of attributes sorted alphabetically, but also a list of HTML elements sorted alphabetically with the information for each of them, which CSS attribute can be applied to it. It makes the book thicker, but you could have compensated that by using thinner paper and use less empty line in the content.

I hope that my suggestions might find it into a future, version of the book, which also incorporated the CSS 3.0 attributes that are supported by some of the latest browsers like Mozilla Firefox.

By the time I was taking my second or third CSS course, this book became a life saver. Even now, 2 years later, this is the one book I cary around with me for syntax.

Mr. Meyer also adds a lot more flavor and discussion than I would expect from a desk reference. Impressive!

Nicely written, very informative. My deduction of a star is for the reference having neither examples nor page numbers where a more detailed explanation would be found. This is a common omission, so I would still recommend this book. I would not recommend this as a first introduction to web authoring, as it is strictly CSS, which of course does nothing without structural mark-up. For those who have been building sites for a while, and need some guidance and insite into CSS, this is a great choice. However, for those who have very little or no experience I would instead recommend 'Build your website the right way...' by Ian Lloyd.

As others have pointed out this is not a CSS "cookbook" full of design templates. If that is what you are looking for, you will be disappointed. If however, you want to understand CSS, how it works, best practices and so on, this is a great book. Although you can find all of the info in various places on the web, Mr. Meyer is a good author explaining in detail how things work and bringing up valuable points to be aware of along the way. A good addition to any web developers library.

Before purchasing this book, I had purchased about a half dozen books on css, one from the same author. I was really surprised to find new ways to use css that I hadn't learned in the other books. Each topic is discussed completely and in detail. For a reference on css, this book is the best I've found.

Most of the stuff that you learn in CSS can be found already ONLINE and before I bought this book, I had a very good fundamental understanding CSS and thought I buy this book for more knowledge and learn anything that I could have missed. Well I did, but I could have found this information online, however I've spent months learning CSS and it's very difficult to found all the things in this CSS book in one place.

I recommend this book if you have the stimulation to learn from a book and the money because of course the internet is FREE.

This is a book about CSS, and CSS, is about the presentation aspect of web pages. How the text appears, the size, the layout, etc.

However, the presentation style inside the book is kind of sloppy. For example, on page 186 and 187, when it talks about inline elements, Figure 7.33 "Strongly emphasized" is printed not as tall as Figure 7.34 and 7.35 when the CSS style is the same. And the word being used is "which is" and is changed to "that is" in Figure 7.34 and 7.35, when it is changing the vertical-align only. The reader would be better helped if they can see the contrast of the CSS style, without the change of wording for no reason at all. Also, in Figure 7.34, the bigger words should not overlap with the smaller words above, as tested in CSS compliant browsers, but it is printed so on the book.

Then again, in Figure 7.36, for no reason at all, the picture is shrunk down to 1/4 size of the previous examples, when they are all talking about the same case except for some vertical-align difference. It may be done just because the page is running out of space. That is pretty sloppy.

On page 181 to 182, it talks about various terms of the inline box model, and there is no figure at all to exemplify the terms at all. Then after the reader goes through a tough time to read through those text of hard definitions, 3 pages later, the figures start to appear. Please, can the book be designed so that the readers are considered? CSS is partly for making the content easy for the audience, and how about this CSS book is made easier for its audience too?

Those who understand CSS will find a trove here. One may trudge through other one true holy grail bulletproof designs. They have their place.

Then, leap, at last, into this book. It's been sitting on your bookshelf, perhaps, undeservedly ignored, for a week? You peruse. You find the page for your problem. You read, carefully. A light bulb! "Of course," you may think! Or, "He's telling me, what I SHOULD have known!"

Yes, but, everybody needs SOMEONE to gather these essential prods. Here they are, distilled, a fine essence. Rock solid. No fluff. Problem, stated clearly; solution, stated plainly; sample code, crisp. Just what you need. Terse. Precise.

Hi

I have read about half the book and I find it very interesting and very practical. The book gives you patterns and approaches to solve the problems which designers confront daily. The index is also very helpful at the back, which points me straight to the solution of the problem which I am seeking. When compared to other books, this gives more than what every other book is giving, which I have seen. Generally all CSS books give various properties of the html elements, its possible values etc. While this book, has a different approach. This book discusses the affect of changing these element properties based on the context where the element is placed. It has very good discussion of the box model concept and positioning concepts.

Till now, I have loved this book and has become my reference for all my css needs.

There is some useful information in this book, but the author's rigid adherence to the format works against the presentation of it. I find that Andy Budd's book (CSS Mastery ...) is a much better book. They seem very different but I think that many developers will read them needing the same information.

Further, as is becoming more and more the case with new apress titles, the copy editing is substandard. It's a pity, as apress had such a good reputation for quality books, and this kind of thing is hurting them.

I often rely on readers reviews before making a purchase so I thought it appropriate to give feedback on this book.
I am a self-taught programmer who needed to take my CSS knowledge to the next level. This book clearly sets the bar high and helps me get over it almost daily. The models depicted are extremely accurate and on point, and foster a wealth of ideas that extend to some really nice models. Mr. Bowers research and implementation on cross-compatability between browsers is nothing short of excellent (a big learn for me). The style in which the book is written makes it easy to follow and learn from, as well as reference. As a new programmer, I am extremely pleased with this book as it has taken me to the next level of CSS.
I would recommend this book to anyone who, like me, has a general knowledge of CSS and wants to fine tune and hone their skills in CSS.

This book is a nuts and bolts CSS/HTML reference book, that you'll be pulling off the shelf frequently, when editing stylesheets and web pages.

Each entry is presented in this clear, practical and timely format, that allows skimming straight down to the section you want (borderless table format, not inline paragraphs):

Problem
Solution
Pattern
Location
Limitations
Advantages - (Some entries)
Disadvantages - (Some entries)
Example - (Some entries)
Tips
Related to - (Some entries)
See also

It doesn't waste your time with 1001 details of each tag, yet does give you the essentials you need to know about each tag (some entries have screenshots of the examples, mostly in Firefox, but some in IE7), so you can get to work quickly -- and not get bogged down by the hyped cheerleading, that fills many of these CSS/XHTML books these days.

Would've given this book 5 stars if the author spent more time with cross-browser support other than a few tip suggestions, especially with IE 7, as it uses conditionals instead of hacks to get around the box model SNAFUs. Cross-browser troubleshooting is essential, and not an after thought to be addressed with about 20 words -- more time is spent debugging than actually writing code, and it needs to be addressed accordingly.

Overall, this is the best CSS/(X)HTML reference book I've found to date. It's due to the presentation format above, that doesn't have you trying to find some remote reference in microprint, in a sea of 500+ pages!

Now a days, creating a web site is more about design than development; resources exist on the internet where millions of web developers will share their ideas and creativity for free - but how does one access it and where are these resources located?? The Missing Manual Series, Creating Web Sites addresses these questions and more. This book is an excellent starter book for those who are just getting their feet wet in the world of web design, development and programming, but that's not to say that an expert wouldn't find this book a handy resource. Creating Web Sites also answers a lot of questions that I had about different aspects of web development. The section on e-commerce and the other web resources referenced within the book, points you to the right places in which to grab code, and get ideas to build great web sites. The Missing Manual series is one that I recommend to everyone (this is the 2nd book from the series I own) - all the books are very thorough, but easy to follow; if you're a novice this book should be required, if you're a pro this should be a handy resource to add to your library.

Some of the introductions are a little dated (i.e. jokes that reference beanie babies, etc.), but the other content of the book is still pretty current. This is a really helpful book for the beginning web designer. It is definitely a good reference to have, espically for design students. This book covers things that appear in the software Dreamweaver. It discusses codes for things such as CSS, HTML, etc.

A great book for any novice trying to build a web site. The book is divided into clear sections each giving excellent advise and information. I recommend this to anyone starting a web site. If you are fortunate enough to have Dreamweaver software for web creating I also strongly recommend "Dreamweaver 8 - The Missing Manual.

I have been searching for a good, fairly insightful, starter book on what to do to set up a website, that wasn't too advanced or way to boring.

This is it! The author knows his stuff, brings it into the learning forum in such a way that you are excited to read the next section and re-read for additional insights previously completed sections.

I am going to use this book, and will probably buy more by the same author/publisher.

The book is clear, concise and comprehensive. It covers from how to get a domain name to how to accept credit card payments.I like the emphasis in formating using CSS instead html. This was a new concept for me. The author introduces java scripts and dynamic html. I missed a chapter about how to organize, and keep update the whole web site (sometimes with hundreds of web pages, pictures, icons, etc...). It was one of my first book about the topic and I really think that it's a powefull introductory book.