Web Design and Development Books


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Web Design and Development Books sorted by Average customer review: high to low .

Web Design and Development
Programming WPF
Published in Paperback by O'Reilly Media, Inc. (2007-08-28)
Authors: Chris Sells and Ian Griffiths
List price: $49.99
New price: $28.19
Used price: $26.50

Average review score:

Sells Sells
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-18
I have both WPF books by Chris Anderson and Adam Nathan. I read initial chapters of both of them but never got so excited to continue reading and got astray into LINQ and other stuff. Then I bought this one from Chris Sells and all I can say is it is much better than both Anderson and Adam book and the book keeps you engaged making you eager to find out what next in very simple terms and wonderful example. I loved the way the data binding chapter was explained and am hoping to finish this soon.

Great Job Sells and Ian.

A book even Evangelists can learn from
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-05
I'm almost ashamed to admit that after diving into WPF back when it was known as "Avalon", I haven't even touched WPF since. So I finally needed to suck it up, get started, and learn WPF.

As somebody new to WPF, I just have to give a huge "Thank You" to both Chris and Ian. This book is very entertaining and the quality of the writing between both Chris and Ian is just tremendous. The pace of the book is perfect and the teaching style is one that any developer can relate to.

As a Technical Evangelist working for Microsoft, I think that every "Evangelist" in the tech industry can learn from Chris and Ian on how to tell a compelling story that developers can relate to and "grok". We evangelists are all-too-willing to simply explain the technical details of an API while completely forgetting to answer the "why" (let alone telling a compelling story to suck people in). This is yet another area that this book excels at.

I can say with full confidence that this book is the first book I recommend to anybody wanting to dive into WPF. Enjoy!

Jason Olson, Technical Evangelist, Visual Studio & the .NET Framework
[...]

Witty, clearly written, easy to understand -- an excellent book!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-08-25
Writing a programming book is not an easy thing to do -- I know, because I've done it myself. And I have to say that I'm really impressed with the job that Chris Sells and Ian Griffiths have done with "Programming WPF". This is one of the best programming books I've ever read (and I've read a lot of them).

For a programming book to be good, it's not enough for it to simply contain all of the information that you need to know. If that information doesn't stick to your brain, then the book hasn't done it's job. If you want the information to stick, then the book has to be interesting to read. It has to have a lot of clear examples that show you real-world applications without extraneous fluff. And to be really effective, all of that should be done with a little bit of style and wit.

And I'm really pleased to say that "Programming WPF" does all of those things. I recently needed a refresher on WPF, so I just spent a lot of time over the last few weeks going through the book very carefully. And I have to say that I'm really impressed. It's engaging, interesting and they chose really good examples. And it's witty! (You'd be amazed at how the occasional chuckle keeps a reader from getting that "eyes glazed over" feeling that far too many books induce.)

I know from experience -- believe me, I know! -- just how hard it is to pull that off. And they did it with style. So first of all, congratulations to Chris and Ian for doing a great job. And second, if you're a C# developer looking for a good, hands-on way to learn WPF, I highly recommend "Programming WPF".

Even better than the 1st edition
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-05-13
I bought the first edition of this book called Programming Windows Presentation Foundation (AKA Avalon) at the PDC in 2005 and read it completely on the plane home.

When I heard the second edition was released I didn't think much would have changed, but this is even better than the first edition. It's twice as big and covers all major (and not so major) topics in WPF (inc. an introduction to 3D and Silverlight).

I think this book will proof to be for WPF what Programming Windows, Fifth Edition is for WIN32 programming.

This Book is a Valuable Resource
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-05-02
This book is the most in depth resource into WPF i have seen. And not just that, it gets to the good stuff that you'll actually use in your code and not just filler or lists of properties that you can get from intelisense. The examples are extremely useful.

The other benefit of this book is that it doesn't just tell you how to do things, but why. This is incredibly helpful in finding the best solution to your specific problem.

Thanks guys! great book!
Ralph

Web Design and Development
Web Standards Solutions: The Markup and Style Handbook (Pioneering Series)
Published in Paperback by friends of ED (2004-06-07)
Author: Dan Cederholm
List price: $34.99
New price: $21.80
Used price: $16.16

Average review score:

Great book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-15
A great handbook showcasing common CSS uses. Will definitely keep this by my side when developing.

A useful read for the web novice
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-07-23
This book was not exactly what I expected when I purchased it. I've been working with XHTML for 2 years professionally, but I still hadn't bothered to read up on web standards.

The book is well organized and goes over the basics of HTML elements (ol, ul, em, strong, p, etc...) and does a nice job explaining the benefits of using the most recent standards when selecting an appropriate tag.

Being that I have had experience coding, I'd recommend this book to those will little on hands practice or knowledge of markup. It's an excellent tutorial on the functionality of common HTML tags as well as some of the more obscure ones (code, samp, var, abbr, dl, etc...)

The most beneficial lessons learned in this book, however, is something the novice and experienced coder will appreciate: accessibility. W3C has been pushing the development of accessibility development for awhile. Screen readers and browsers are finally coming of age where such code considerations will set your website above others. Additionally, in professional arenas, accessibility can be a money-maker.

The author does an excellent job of explaining how screen readers and those with disabilities can benefit from more advanced and considerate markup. After all, how it looks matters little when your user cannot see the screen.

XHTML & CSS - Start with this book!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-08-14
With only a casual tinker in Dreamweaver split view under my belt starting out, I learned how to hand code XHTML and CSS with this book alone (well, and some web research here and there and CSS Mastery is an excellent follow up). It's written clearly and gives multiple solutions for each case, while explaining the advantages and disadvantages of each. I cannot recommend this book enough, as even after I finished it, it remains close by as an invaluable desk reference that I refer to here and there.

Excellent book!
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-09-14
This is an excellent book that all web designers should own. When I look at people's sites, I often validate them just out of curiosity, and it is so rare that I ever find a valid site. I always pay attention to validation, and this book just validates (for lack of a better term) my opinions on the importance of following web standards. This book is good for helping with workarounds for certain browsers (cough, IE) that don't support standards that most others do.

Solid if not exhaustive or succinct
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2008-05-11
Web Standards Solutions is reasonably solid title that discusses the benefits and approaches of using web standards in the design of (X)HTML markup. CSS is also covered as a means to remove presentational elements from web page markup. Lists, tables, headings, hyperlinks, forms, quotations and layouts are all covered to a foundational level.

The information covered in the book is especially suited to new web site designers who are yet to understand these concepts. Web application developers - who might not focus their craft on the quality of their markup, would also benefit greatly. For others already possessing an basic understanding of semantic markup and presentation through CSS, the book might contain a few useful tips only.

Throughout each chapter the book doggedly follows a pattern that can become tedious. For each chapter, non-standards approaches are considered before the 'correct' standards based approach is shown. After this the 'extra credit' portion of the chapter provides practical applications of the given solution. Whereas the correct solution and extra credit sections are useful, the repetition of the defective non-standard approaches for in every chapter is sometimes repetitive and slightly contrived, and could be discussed more casually as required without dominating the format of every chapter.

Having said that, the book is easily read, has examples and practical applications, covers the breadth of the topic well and could certainly be used to bring anyone up to speed on the basics of standards-based approaches to the web page markup development.

Web Design and Development
Build Your Own Website The Right Way Using HTML & CSS
Published in Paperback by SitePoint (2006-05-02)
Author: Ian Lloyd
List price: $29.95
New price: $19.77
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Average review score:

Very nice book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-02
I just finished reading this book and it was a very excellent beginning introduction to HTML and CSS. Thank you Ian lloyd.
This book edition was updated January 2008.

XHTML and CSS for beginners in a nontechnical way
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-09
Despite the title the book is teaching you XHTML, a more standardized and stricter version of HTML.
XHTML is set to be the progression from HTML so you should learn the XHTML standards rather than HTML.

There is a strong focus on using XHTML and CSS together, all explained in a non-technical manner; the author does not have an academic degree in computer science so you will get a humane explanation of things.

This book is ideal for anyone starting out in web development/programming.

The author has an international audience in mind, which you can tell from his recommendation to use UTF-8 rather than Unicode.






The best book yet on CSS
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2008-08-14
This book is brilliant, CSS is easy to learn using this book, the progress you can make is also very good as it is easy to understand. The book arrived earlier than stated and was in perfect condition. Full marks to everyone. ThanksBuild Your Own Website The Right Way Using HTML & CSS, 2nd Edition

Wonderful Resource for Novice
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2008-07-04
This is a very good book. I have been stumbling around for some months now trying to figure out how to do web site development, yet never having had any training to do so. I'm only half way through this book, but it is like the lights have come on. This book really made sense to me. It was easy to understand and the directions were written in terms that anyone could understand and follow. I agree that it would have been nice to have some color, but it was okay not having it if that meant keeping the cost down. Once I finish this book, I'll be moving on to another that will teach me how to work in the Dreamweaver CS3 Suite, a program I have been stumbling around in for some months now with no success. I feel like Ian Lloyd's book has provided a firm foundation on which I could build before moving on to DW and CSS.

If you are a first time wanna be web site designer, with no computer training or experience, yet want to learn a firm foundation on which to build, I would highly recommend this book.

Web Standards, XHTML, CSS--THE Book For Learning
Helpful Votes: 7 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2008-07-03
I teach college courses on Web development that emphasize Web standards and usability. This is one of only two entry-level (X)HTML + CSS books that I will recommend to students, and this is THE book I recommend for those who want to get started in the field as an in-depth guide to standards-based Web development, or as an excellent, no-frills reference for your Web development bookshelf.

Web Design and Development
Foundation PHP for Dreamweaver 8
Published in Paperback by friends of ED (2005-12-19)
Author: David Powers
List price: $39.99
New price: $3.94
Used price: $3.94

Average review score:

Disappointed and which I could return it
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2007-09-26
This man makes a promise of a written format that can be followed. The writtng is NOT CLEAR and leaves much to the readers imagination of to what exactly the format should be. There is no CD so that you can see how the step by step process works. He names his files but does not show the real differences between how he is set up and how you can set up to fit your needs. I waisted my money. He claims in the book there is support which at best is terrible.

The worst book I have ever bought on coding. If I were you try another writter.

Informative though somewhat disorganized
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-09-19
This is a good book. It teaches many useful techniques and how lots of "how to" ideas. However, the faux site that is created isn't goal oriented which left me feeling like the book was just a collection of random things to do. It seemed disorganized at times when you would or wouldn't create another page from scratch vs. revamping one you had already made. It was not always clear why you would be better to take one approach vs. the other. Setting up the localhost environment was somewhat confusing, though not too bad.

I will definitely use it frequently. Good information, good book, good deal.

David Powers is the man!
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-12-12
This book is written very clearly and is really easy to follow. I've learned a lot of other really useful stuff than just the PHP content, things that I now realise I should have been taught by the official Dreamweaver 8 book, but weren't. The PHP content for which I bought this book is fantastic - much better than another generic PHP/MySQL I have read, as this is tailored to the Dreamweaver 8 environment which takes a lot of the guessing out of the equation. This book is written by and for people who use Dreamweaver 8 in a practical situation. I'm still less than half way through my book and already feel like I've learned much more than I expected. Highly recommended. I'll be checking out Mr Powers' other books when I finish this one. Thanks David Powers, you're a genius!

If 4.5 stars were an option, I'd go with that
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-10-13
This is a very good book for learning PHP, and surprisingly, most of the examples work right out of the book as he's written them, which seems rare for a programming book these days. The projects that he has you complete are highly relevant to what you'd actually be doing with PHP, and that makes it even better.

The only trouble I had with this book was that he sure packed a lot of information into each chapter, and he didn't use the sidebars as much as I would have hoped. It's easy enough to follow along with the examples the first time, but if you want to go back again and figure out how he programmed a small detail, you'll never find it unless you reread the whole chapter again. All it would have taken was a few little bullets here and there in the margins to point out some of the off-topic stuff that was going on in the examples, and the book would be much more functional as a reference. As it stands, I probably will have to get a whole new book for that purpose.

Also, the support on this book is phenomenal. I missed a small detail in Chapter 6 that caused my script to fail, and when I posted on the book's message board, I had a reply from the author in less than a day. That's a really cool added bonus.

Excellent book to set up dynamic pages in Dreamweaver using php
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-10-31
I am a frontpage user that has set up static pages in a web site. I needed to move from static pages to dynamic pages using a database. I couldn't use PHP with FrontPage so I switched to Dreamweaver and needed a book that covered both dynamic pages and Dreamwaver. This book walked me through setting up the environment to have Dreamweaver work with Apache, PHP, MySQL and phpMyAdmin. I am completely non-technical so these areas were beyond my comfort zone but the book walked me through it very successfully. It then took me through CSS styles, setting up an online feedback form, setting up my first database and tying it into Dreamweaver. It also showed how to insert, delete and maintain records in order to keep the database up to date. This was an excellent book for a non-techie as it didn't take any knowledge for granted.

Web Design and Development
Expert One-on-One J2EE Design and Development
Published in Paperback by Peer Information (2002-10)
Author: Rod Johnson
List price: $59.99
New price: $22.33
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Average review score:

VERY GOOD BOOK FOR J2EE DESIGN
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-02
This book gives the right approach to programming with J2EE tools. It explains when to use J2EE and when not to.
It's not only useful for J2EE programming but also for non-J2EE enterprise projects as well. I STRONGLY recommend it. I have learnt so much from this book.

The best J2EE Design Book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-05-21
I bought this book because I've read very good reviews. I found this book amazing. This books shows you how to make good designs and develop in J2EE, all the chapters with full of comments from Rod's experience. Many of the concepts of this book were later applied in Spring framework. I strongly recommend read this book for advanced Java developers.

Ignore the publication date
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2008-01-27
Frankly, this book has gotten a little long in the tooth. One might say that, from the products it mentions and evaluates, it is out of date. But never mind!

Rod applies principles that never go out of date - only the examples do - or seem to. A product is stuck with its basic design forever. Thus a critique of the 2002 version of Struts is as valid as a critique of the 2007 version.

Pros: Readable. Insightful. It will make you a better architect.

Cons: Typos (how do chapters get mis-numbered in the ToC?!?) It really should be in a high-quality hard binding (though the binding is quite good for paper).

Summary: 'J2EE Design...' is worth much more than its weight in gold. Buy it. READ IT!

Excellent book - Needs updated code samples and J2EE 1.4 support
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2006-04-21
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, particularly well-thought out design guidelines for developing J2EE application with or without EJB. The author introduced several best practices particularly the concepts and usage of Spring and Hibernate based j2ee development is quite helpful. In addition to this book, I find patterns and bestpractices from "Core J2EE Patterns /Deepak Alur", "Core Security Patterns /Christopher Steel" and "Enterprise Integration Patterns /Gregor Hohpe" would be helpful - especially if you are building a enterprise-class j2ee applications.
Now the downside, the book needs a complete revision to include changes with J2EE 1.4. The CODE SAMPLES explained in this book does'nt work now - please update.

Great book !
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 18 total.
Review Date: 2006-04-28
It is a great book. But I give it only 4 stars is because it is hard to read. English is my 2nd language. I cannot read this book quickly. I even need check dictionary at least 2 times per page. I do not have the same problem when read other tech books.
"What is WebSphere" is another book I like. Also help me to learn system level stuff. It is much easier to read. Though it does not have so many stuff like Johnson's book.
I would like to suggest the auther to consider many tech readers are not very good at English.

Web Design and Development
Taking Your Talent to the Web: A Guide for the Transitioning Designer
Published in Paperback by New Riders Publishing (2001-05-18)
Author: Jeffrey Zeldman
List price: $40.00
New price: $25.00
Used price: $6.35

Average review score:

Dated but still very valuable
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-12-30
It's now over 6 years since this book came out and it still has a tremendous amount of relevance. I am rereading it again and stop by every now and then in hopes that a new edition will come out. I have all the other Zeldman books and they are all useful, but nothing approaches how much I learned from this book. It amazes me how much of the content is still applicable. Anyone who's been doing this since the book came out can make mental notes about what has changed. A proponent of CSS before it was practical (really), Jeffrey seems to have planned a long shelf life for this book.

If you're a graphic designer who is entering web development (which is a large segment), it's still a must read, but beware the 4.x browser version suggestions, and don't bother to try and support tables any more. It's not necessary, and it's bad form for oh, so many reasons. Everything else in the book is absolutely essential for the transition. Your best bet would be to read it and ask questions from someone who's been developing websites for a long time (and is open to web standards).

And if you've been building these things for a long time, it's still a great book to revisit at least yearly.

You can't really go wrong with a Zeldman book, imho, at least so far. If he writes something on knitting, I can't guarantee it...

Good overview of Web Design Roots
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2005-09-21
This book gives a good overview of Web Design till 2001.
People who are interested in where the web is coming from will like this book. If your are looking for how web design is done today anno 2005 I would like to recommend Jeffrey Zeldman book "Designing with web standards".

Helpful Guidance for Newbies or Veterans
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2004-10-05
Even though some of the content in this book is outdated (such is the nature of a book based on the internet, which evolves daily), it is still a mainstay in my collection. I would recommend this book to anyone even remotely interested in web design.

Jefferey Zeldman teaches basic, foundation building principles that you will use almost daily during your tenure as a web designer. If your looking for a book to hold you by the hand and teach you how to perform specific actions with step by step coding, this isn't your book. Instead, it touches upon ideas and methods. Zeldman covers topics from designing good navigation to fundamental steps in working with a potential client.

I gave this book 4 out of 5 stars. It would have received a perfect score if it wasn't for some outdated material. Purchase this book, it should be a part of any collection.

Most excellent
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2002-12-08
A thorough, comprehensive and usable book for people trying to migrate from traditional media into the (sometimes) scary world of new media.

Jeffrey Zeldman's unique voice permeates the entire book, holds your hand, and gently guides you through the ups & downs of working with the web. His examples are concise and to the point, his writing style (as always) humorous and friendly, and, most importantly, you get the feeling that he truly loves this medium, and would like nothing more than being able to help another person discover just what the fuss is all about.

Should be on the shelf of every designer - no matter what your level of experience is.

this book changed my website forever
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2003-05-28
This book opened my eyes to issues such as accesibilty, css and xhtml, I now have a site that is fast to load and easy to update. I found this book to be an easy read,[ I am neither a graphic designer nor a trained web designer] I really like Zeldman's writng style and will use some of his points in my classes web design for photographers. The mix of code and ideas was great and for once I just read the book rather than being tempted into turning on my computer and starting work.

Web Design and Development
Beginning ASP.NET 1.1 E-Commerce: From Novice to Professional
Published in Paperback by Apress (2004-06-07)
Authors: Cristian Darie and Karli Watson
List price: $39.99
New price: $1.99
Used price: $1.97

Average review score:

Great How to on E-Commerce
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2005-07-25
I found this book to be extremely helpful in constructing an eCommerce site. It's a great book for an experienced VB developer to use to jump into developing an e-commerce site, even if you only go through the PayPal integration. It's also a great source of material on the construction of a shopping cart, and even if your "shopping cart" is only going to be used on a companie's intranet for product/supply request/issue, it's a great starting point. As a developer I can modify the business tier code to conform to my companies requirements and concentrate on the presentation layer.

Simply the Best ASP E-Commerce book!
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2005-07-14
This little book is chock-full of detailed explanations and examples of an e-commerce site built with ASP.net and an SQL database. It's simply the best and definitely most-used technical book on ASP.net I've picked up in the past 2 years! In addition to the detailed explanations, I especially like the lucid examples of creating and calling the SQL Stored Procedures. Learning by example seems to be the most effective way for this novice programmer to complete an e-commerce site, and this book has greatly reduced the amount of time it normally takes to scan through multiple sources of technical information when creating a complex application. Thanks to the authors, Christian Darie & Karli Watson, for providing a comprehensive resource!

Excellent and informative book
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2004-11-16
I've used this book to construct my first e-commerce website, and I don't think I could have managed without it. The 3 tier design of the sample site is very well organised and easy to adapt to your own requirements. It also makes it simpler for a novice like me to understand how everything works. I found the second part of the book (dealing with the order pipeline and credit card transactions) harder to follow. However, when I contacted the authors about a problem I was having, I received a prompt and friendly reply that soon got me back on track. Thanks, Cristian and Karli!

Fully functional, basic webstore
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2004-12-18
This is an exeptionally well written book for the beginning webstore developer with

It walks you through a complete design of the side with the end result that you have a basic webstore that you could actually take operational. The only weakness in the credit processing section. It's written for a European credit card gateway. It would be nice if one of the more popular US gateways (e.g. authorize.net) was also included.

I also sent a couple of questions to the author and he was responded very quickly ... obviously he's interested in making sure everyone reading the book is successful. 5 stars for that alone.

More end-to-end ASP.NET, less e-commerce
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2004-11-10
This is primarily a book about constructing an ASP.NET web site using stored procedures, and less a book about e-commerce. There are a few sections, mostly at the end, which are specific to e-commerce. These include the order processing pipeline chapter and the credit card transactions chapter.

This is not to say the book is bad. It's very well written and the code is described step-by-step in detail. There could have been more emphasis on architecture, and a little more on e-commerce. I would also like to see some emphasis on the sticky legal issues like customer data management, password security, transaction security, and how and when to migrate the data off of the machines on the open Internet and back into safe storage on the Intranet.

Web Design and Development
The Essential Guide to Dreamweaver CS3 with CSS, Ajax, and PHP
Published in Paperback by friends of ED (2007-07-22)
Author: David Powers
List price: $49.99
New price: $30.00
Used price: $20.00

Average review score:

Great book for any dreamweaver developer
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-10-07
I dont normally review books, but I thought this one was worth reviewing. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who works with dreamweaver and wants to create modern, standards compliant websites and web applications.

The book is well written and thoroughly covers the subjects it claims to cover.

Each chapter is also written in such a way that it could be read independently of the other chapters. This is highly useful if you only want to cover one or two of the three primary subjects covered (css, php and ajax with Dreamweaver cs3).

By the end of this book you will be able to create basic (though useful) web apps, validate user input in forms, use dreamweaver's built in ajax functions (spry) to make content much more interesting and create standards compliant websites that will be viewable in all browsers.

Great way to learn
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-30
I have a lot of books. I teach this stuff and try to read everything I can. This book is great. Easy to follow and the tasks are a useful way to learn how to use CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). This goes from easy to more advanced in each section so anyone that needs to learn how to use CSS will get value. I highly recommend this book.

This guy is a very excellent teacher
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-27
I've been through this book hard enough...everytime I think the author got some missed point, no...it was my own mistake. I go back and read over again the part where I encounter the problem and thats it..The author has never left anything incorrect. I encounter a lot of frustrating part (cursing the author!) but when I turn back, again; it was my mistake. I left some paragraph unread. (Sorry.) David had done an excellent job concerning about his readers. He definitely try to delivers as best as could and he succeed. Everything works just fine if you care enough to read thoroughly. I've been through with the Vhost, Vista installation, the relative root link, the PhpMyAdmin and yes, it works just fine. My side of advice, honestly; This book is more suitable if you at least have some basic experience working with Dreamweaver. Otherwise, I can't guarantee you know what you're doing (and not enjoy in doing so). Take a basic Dreamweaver book first (such as Adobe in a Classroom. Although it's there are some negative review about it, just ignore it. If you're really a beginner, you will be comfortable with it). And then take on this book. You are on a path of correct way to learn drive fast and efficiently. The combination to success in Dreamweaver is; The Classroom in a book, This book (Essential Guide) and the Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver by stepahanie and greg. Finishing this three, further on with the PHP. That's all. And for me, again; David Powers has done an excellent job.

Best in class
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-01
I LOVE THIS BOOK. David Powers did a great job on this book. I've been looking for a book to teach me dreamweaver cs3, css, and php and this book delivers. It killed three birds with one stone. The book is wonderfully written, easy to understand, easy to follow, contains no php errors. This book has saved me countless hours of headaches and frustration. This is a sixth book I bought on php and it actually works. Only bad thing about this book is you wished there was more, a part 2. Once you start this book you can't sit it down. Everything goes so smooth. David Powers has me hooked I hope he writes a book for cs4 when it come out.

Title is misleading, it's not about PHP or AJAX
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2008-08-10
This is a purchase that I regret. :-( I was quite disappointed by the misleading title. The book contains decent coverage of Dreamweaver for beginners. The book is not quite a tutorial but it is definitely not a comprehensive reference.

The book covers how to do basics in Spry. Spry is the AJAX framework bundled in Dreamweaver. There is no depth in the writing on Spry, and the coverage of RESTful and AJAX is minimal. The same can be said for the treatment of PHP. The coverage of PHP is superficial. There's no practical guidance on how to use PHP in Dreamweaver application development.

Two is harsh, because this is an average book and it probably merits a 3 but for the misleading title. However, I can't bring myself to mark it as a 2 because the author saw a way to sell copies. Returning to Dreamweaver after missing a couple releases, I found "Dreamweaver CS3: The Missing Manual" to be a more complete book, and while it also covers Spry and a bit of PHP it makes no pretensions about its focus.

Web Design and Development
Letting Go of the Words: Writing Web Content that Works (Interactive Technologies) (Interactive Technologies) (Interactive Technologies)
Published in Paperback by Morgan Kaufmann (2007-06-11)
Author: Janice (Ginny) Redish
List price: $49.95
New price: $28.88
Used price: $33.94

Average review score:

A Bullseye
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-18
'Letting Go' is a wonderful guide for creating web content. It gives concrete strategies for making the words you haven't let go of truly work for your site. It teaches how to put your users first and structure and write content that will smoothly get them where they want to be and happily engage when they arrive. This book helps you to understand the logic of usability and in turn free up your creativity for making effective navigation and messaging.

I recommended this to a friend of mine who is a VP of a web development company and he turned around and sent me a link to their recommendation that ALL their clients read 'Letting Go'.

Outstanding resource for both writing and designing web pages
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-12
Letting Go of the Words is very clear, easy to read, well organized, and thorough. It offers numerous examples of what works and what doesn't, and it explains why. The author covers best practices for web content in a manner that is easy to understand and implement.

While the title of the book makes it seem like it only discusses "words," it actually covers much more than that. The real focus is on making your site more user-friendly. I found discussions of links, illustrations, active and passive space, and general style recommendations to be extremely useful.

I think this book would be just as useful for someone who is designing pages as someone who is just writing content. Much of the book goes over design best practices that would be helpful to programmers and designers.

Overall an excellent resource. Highly recommended.

Extremely insightful and easy to understand
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-02
"Letting Go of the Words" is a book that I recommend to all of my new web content authors. It's easy to understand language and visual examples really make this book a great read. I really appreciated the attention to accessibility and usability as well as they are becoming fundamental to good web design.

Hang Onto this Book!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-08-25
I've worked with a web developer for 2 years, and have stayed on the editorial side. However, now I have more input into the site design, and I'm finding great assistance from Ginny Redish. She's done her homework to help the reader delve into the minds of their site visitors, and thinks outside the normal constraints.

It offers technical assistance without being a coding manual, and for the creative person who is not a coder or developer, this is a terrific tool!

It's not for the programmer who knows the how-to side, but it's for the content and creative person trying to attract the right attention and reach the right people.

A must-read for any web developer
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2008-06-25
This book should be considered required reading for anyone designing and developing sites.

Most of the websites online do not follow the practices outlined in this book and would be better off if they did.

The book is filled with clear examples and shows bad content and then the ways to improve it.

Great book!

Web Design and Development
Beginning ASP.NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005: From Novice to Professional
Published in Paperback by Apress (2005-10-17)
Authors: Cristian Darie and Karli Watson
List price: $44.99
New price: $26.98
Used price: $25.50

Average review score:

Great book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-30
I am into this book halfway as a part of my personal training program having completed a couple of other books first. This book seems to give the whole package. I consider it superior to a Wrox book I have, but I wish it split apart the coding more like a Wrox book. Lot's of typing! Anyway, this book's a keeper!

Great Book - Arrived In a Timely Fashion
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-16
Great book. Taking me through all the ins and outs of E-Commerce. It's not perfect with some documented errata on the website. But more than adequate for any coder with a pulse.

Estou muito satisfeito de ter este livro !!!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-01-29
Dos ultimos livros que tenho comprado, assim como os da serie Head First da O'Really este livro superou muito as minhas espectativas.

Como um livro de tutorial foi maravilhoso e me trouxe muito conteudo !!!

Realmente vale a pena !!!

Excellent book
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-09-06
It's an excellent book, the book teaches you how to develop a site in three layers (presentation, business and data) in my ishe goal of this book.

Essential Book for ANY E-Commerce .NET 2.0 Developers!!!
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2007-02-09
'Beginning ASP .NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005: From Novice to Professional' by Cristian Darie and Karli Watson is one of the most unique and important books out there for anyone that is developing an E-Commerce site with ASP.NET 2.0. Starting from scratch, the authors step by step show you how to get a site running and WORKING well and efficient. Packed with 650+ pages of material, the authors break the steps down in logical parts, show how they go about the work to be done, and then provide the code which does the dirty work. Not only is it helpful, but it's a joy to follow the steps as so much of the curtain is pulled away to show the developer how to get the job done. This is easily one of my favorite Apress books that I have seen. One of the nicest things about the Apress line of books is the fact that they write and publish books that no one else seems to and this is a perfect example of this. I'll close with a chapter overview for your inspection:

01. Starting off
02. Laying Out the Foundation
03. Creating the Product Catalog: Part I
04. Creating the Product Catalog: Part II
05. Searching the Catalog
06. Improving Performance
07. Receiving Payments Using PayPal
08. Catalog Administration
09. Creating a Custom Shopping Cart
10. Custom Orders
11. Making Product Recommendations
12. Adding Customer Accounts
13. Advanced Customer Orders
14. Order Pipeline
15. Implementing the Pipeline
16. Credit Card Transactions
17. Integrating with Amazon

Tack on 2 appendixes to the end and you have a MUST-HAVE book for anyone that is looking to achieve the same goals that this books does!!

***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED


Books-Under-Review-->Computers-->Internet-->Web Design and Development
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