Customer Reviews

Advanced Professional Web Design: Techniques & Templates (CSS & XHTML) (Charles River Media Internet)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

As a professional programmer I purchased this book to master CSS & XHTML Table-less layouts. As as advanced programmer I was surprised to see the first 100 pages of the book were written as a beginner's overview of how the web works. (A total waste of time for me.) The second part of the book takes you through a step by step process of creating layouts. The problem is the code added in each step is combined with all the previous work and the reader is left trying to sort out the differences in the code examples. Additionally The code examples are NOT provided on the CD. For some insane reason the images in the book are provided instead. I tried to contact the author to inquire if I am using the book incorrectly, but there has been no response. It appears to me that what is missing is the layout concepts. Clint jumps right in to the examples before explaining the process. It was not until I combed through the 140 examples before I realized his technique was to nest absolutely positioned div's in parent relatively positioned div's. Once I deduced that small piece of critical knowledge, the rest fell into place. The 140 examples are nice, but really only 5-6 are needed.

A far better book is: HTML Utopia: Designing Without Tables Using CSS

I have Clint Eccher's "Professional Web Design" (2008), and I have found it useful, so I thought that "Advanced Professional Web Design" (2007) would take up where that left off. Instead, three-fourths of the content of the "advanced" book is simply a duplicate of content from the other book. Given my expectation, I was quite disappointed. There are a few chapters beyond the "basic" book that cover database driven sites, but the examples and templates are the same.

You may find one or the other of these two books useful, but the amount of overlap and outright duplication of content between the books is so great that you certainly don't need both.

This book is great for any amateurs that wants to design a professional web site or a career in web design.

As with the first book, the designs included with this one have helped make me look extremely professional among my clients. I am able to customize a couple designs, show them to my clients, and always close the deal. Plus, I learned a lot about creating tableless designs. The book also helped me to better understand the how e-commerce works. I definitely recommend this book for someone needing a quick fix to creating a graphically professional site.

I maintain most of my site by myself. I've wanted to incorporate more css into it. This book gave me the basics to understand how to do so. I, too, wish the examples were available on the cd. However, I was able to acquire the code from the publisher. I have also been able to use of those amazing designs for a second site I am working on. I'm already proud of it, and I've added only five paragraphs of text.
This is not an "advanced" web manual, as the publishers title indicates, but for the average web designer or web site owner, this book offers a high level of easy to follow direction.

I spent months trying to get the colors of my site to go down both sides of the page. When I saw that this book explained this, I bought it instantly. It did not disappoint. I now have a site that does exactly what I need it to do, with very little effort. Along the way, I also discovered a few ways to tweak my code to make it more user friendly. I have had other people in the office comment that I should have used a design or two from the book, but I went with my existing layout. Overall a very helpful resource.

Unlike most people, I purchased this book for the e-mail templates. I was able to add a sharp-looking signature within an hour. Granted, I also understood Photoshop prior to customizing the design. Along the way, I also learned how to create a basic web site, which I plan to have fully operational in a couple days. The tips on e-commerce sites will also be helpful as I continue to develop my home-based business.
Much of the technical mumbo jumbo didn't help me much. I'm not sure how helpful or hurtful it would be to a more experienced designer, but for examples of easy-to-use designs, it works great for me!

I enjoyed this book and the author's first book, which helped me launch my web business. I was a little thrown off by the title of the book. The book explains the basics of advanced programming, which was helpful, but it wasn't as advanced as I hoped it would be. The explanations and examples of building CSS designs were very helpful, though. I was particularly thankful for the method for creating full-height three column layouts. This saved me with a couple clients. I reuse the code for this method on most of my designs now. I love the templates. I suggest going to the author's site to view them to see if it's the quality that you're looking for. The address is included in the review and on this page.

This book takes a very narrow, un-imaginative approach to teaching web design. If you wish to slog through a book to learn one approach to web page design this is the book for you. I suggest you look elsewhere.