Customer Reviews

Designing CSS Web Pages

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

In terms of quality, I'd rate this book as high as anything from Glasshaus, most prominently "Cascading Style Sheets: Separating Content from Presentation".

This book covers a lot of the same ground as the Glasshaus title but I found it particularly useful due to its slightly more graphic design bent. The code samples in the book are not merely basic utility layouts (2 columns, 3 columns, vertical centering etc), but more aesthetically 'designed' examples of using CSS -- a feature clearly missing in a lot of books aimed at the 'web developer' community. I'd venture to say I am not one of those to get so enamoured with the technology itself that they fail to see it as a handy means to an end. I really value Schmitt's efforts in this sense.

Again we get the 'separating content from design' jazz, fair enough, but then the author takes a slightly different direction choosing to show how CSS can be linked to other technologies such as JavaScript and the not-so-common PNG and SVG graphics file formats. PNG (Portable Network Graphics) is partly supported by most modern browsers and offers many advantages over the GIF format. SVG (Scaleable Vector Graphics) is similar to Flash, but can be scripted directly from JavaScript on the page. This may or may not be useful to some of you.

There are many CSS techniques in the W3C specifications that are poorly, inconsistently, or not supported at all, in even the latest browsers. As a practising designer, and not just an academic, Christopher is only too happy to point out the limitations of browsers and explains some of the many pitfalls that await the unwary if you try to push the envelope too far.

The projects, again downloadable from the publisher's Web site, focus on publishing - in business, personal and 'underground' styles. The typography is a lot fancier than any other book I've seen and the attention to detail, even for 'web' typography, is highly commendable.

An earlier review on this website said this book is not well technically edited. I am not sure why that was said, but I work with Opera 6 (and 7 beta), Mozilla 0.9 and above, netscape 6 and above and IE 4 and above. All samples I have tried have impressed me.

In sum, if you want to separate your content from design and give your 'styles' some, er, style, AND if you are fairly familiar with the basic CSS lingo (i.e., you dont need to know box models or glish but should understand what a link rel is), then this is probably a very useful book for you. If you are looking for a very basic introduction to CSS, I'd strongly recommend the Glasshaus book. If you are serious about your work, get both.

First, let me point out that this book is NOT a language/syntax reference for CSS. There are many other (mostly larger) books and web resources that cover the technical details of CSS.

With that said, I found this book to be an excellent design resource. As W3C standards become increasingly accepted, one of the key tasks for web designers is to master separation of content from presentation. XHTML, XML, XSL and CSS are all key components in the effort to streamline web code by separating the "what" from the "how-its-viewed." Designing CSS Web Pages is an excellent primer on how to retool your designs using a more sophisticated approach.

The CSS examples presented in the book are simple, but effective. As a programmer, I spend most of my time worrying about data, not how it looks. The examples helped me quickly transform a project from a boring HTML table-layout into a professional-level presentation. Schmitt's examples demonstrate how to achieve many common effects such as multi-column layouts, layering and a myriad of formatting examples for text. Further, the examples are practical and approachable for most people. Many programming tutorials start with simple examples then proceed to advanced cases without covering the middle. While the exercises in Schmitt's book aren't in laid out as a tutorial, they do demonstrate aspects of CSS that most people will actually use when creating CSS-styled web projects. I found them neither too simple, nor too extravagant (CSS can create some interesting effects). This book focuses on real, practical results.

Finally, the extra sections on non-web CSS usage were interesting, and in the case of the printed examples, quite useful, as found I was able to eliminate some code by simply having CSS create my printer-formatted pages (easier for the user, too). In addition, the interviews with various people involved in the web standards and design community helps highlight the effort to make development on the Internet as consistent and efficient as possible,

Overall, I found this book to be a great companion as I reworked my projects to use CSS. Again, you will want to refer to a complete language reference when writing your CSS code, but I would recommend Designing CSS Web Pages as a style reference for anyone creating new web pages in the proper, content-separated manner.

I bought this book because of Christopher Schmitt's high reputation, and because I'd heard so many positive reports about it. Christopher Schmitt does have a good sense of design, and he uses CSS in an imaginative way, but he's no writer or teacher. The book would be more aptly renamed "Random Thoughts about Web Design". The first two chapters burble on about design principles - important issues, but others have written about the subject far more cogently. Then a chapter about style rules that is likely to confuse the hell out of anyone not already well-versed in CSS. After a few designs, you're then plunged into the mysteries of handling PNG and SVG with CSS. (Yes, those graphics formats that are not supported by the vast majority of browsers in current use.) And where are the basic rules about creating borders, styling text, and other useful things? In an appendix, that's where. Unless Christopher Schmitt can get a better editor to knock some sense of coherence into his thoughts, he should stick to design, and stay well clear of writing. Sorry, this is one of the worst computer books I've read in a long time.

It is apparent that Schmitt has a lot to say and to offer however he does not address the topics completely before he has turned his attention to something else; and unfortunately it is, at times, to a none related subject. The book reads like the story of a person who can't wait to get to the next part of the story so he abandons the part he is telling for the next, and does it repeatedly.

I read this book twice and I'm still wondering 'just what did I get out of it'. I felt the second time as I did the first, like I missed something. Yet I know I didn't. It's just that the content of this book is not well presented. The topics are not addressed completely, that if you did not already have some understanding of CSS you would not get a good one here. If fact I think you would be confused.

In chapter five the author spends almost half the chapter presenting java script apparently without regard as to whether the reader is even familiar with this programing language. The chapter is a waste if you don't know javascript (I don't).

Chapter seven focuses on topics (Utilizing PNG and SVG with CSS) both of which has next to no support is CSS. Couldn't this wait for a later book at a time when the technology is supported? It is a lame rational to ask anyone to remember this technology (most likely for years) till the time it becomes usable.

Part IV (chapters 8-10) while giving examples of what is possible in web design for business, independent publishing and 'underground styles' (what ever that is) the presentations makes no sense - 1. If your intentions are to learn CSS and 2. When neither design example is the law, the rule, standard or effectively makes a point. They're examples with little relevance.

This book at best is a 'survey of CSS' in regards to what it is and what is possible. If the books title and or promo information suggested such it would be easier to be with this book.

It does have a few tidbits to glean from. However it is diapointing on the whole.

This shold have been a larger book with topics completely addressed. It comes through that the author knows the subject, it's just not well addressed here.

I would like to see another book with better and fuller presentation from Schmitt on the subject of 'usable' (i.e. supported) CSS, and properly titled. In short, take this one back and complete it. It would be worth it.

The companion website for this book no longer exists! Major turnoff for me. I'm returning the book tomorrow.

I'm a graphic designer and have gathered some solid background in web design through the years.

The moment I saw Christopher's tutorial "Web Page Reconstruction with CSS" [the website] on Digital Web Magazine mentioning the upcoming book, I immediately knew that this was the book for me.

It turned out to be an eye-opening experience starting with the structured content and moving towards the "styled" end result purely with the implementation of css. I have looked at several other books on css and while many of them provided valuable in-depth knowledge none of them created a spark for me like "Designing CSS Web Pages" did. Like no other author Christopher shows in simple examples how CSS can be used to actually work on the look of pages, accompanied by the underlying code. That makes it the perfect companion for the visual designers out there.

Even the so-called appendix has a lot to offer: the 50 formatting exercises show you how to create variations of a headline followed by a paragraph: headlines separated by various line styles, headlines left-, right- and centre-aligned, headlines residing in their own, coloured box tucked into the text block, headlines spiced up by background images... you name it!

I admit, as others have mentioned, that some chapters require an understanding of other, related techniques like JavaScript, so the book would not seem an ideal choice for beginners. However the examples are clearly presented to be as comprehensive as possible and certainly sparked my interest to deepen my knowledge where it was lacking.

For those that have a basic background the book opens up a bunch of new possibilities - it really is that good.

Poorly conceived and written book

I purchased several CSS books in a flurry of book buying when I first started to learn CSS two months ago. "Designing CSS Web Pages" by Christopher Schmitt was, by far, the worst of them.

Perhaps the worst feature of the book was is uneconomical use of space. As other reviewers point out, there are several places where entire HTML scripts are reproduced, in standard-sized fonts, using a single-column layout. Couldn't the author have reproduced only the relevant snippets of code, or at least used a smaller font or 3-colum layout? Much of this code provided is irrelevant to the example, and the blank space around the code, in sum, probably adds 10 pages to the books length. This waste of space frustrated me and makes the book difficult to navigate.

Further, Schmitt wastes space by including several printed interviews with members of the CSS community. These interviews don't bear directly on the examples, and give the book a rather magazine-like feel. Why include interviews at all? Would you learn to prepare food by reading the biographies of famous chefs, or would you learn by simply learning to dice an onion properly?

Poor writing greatly detracts from Schmitt's exposition of the material. Other reviewers here have provided examples of his murky syntax. Let me tell you, there are far more examples of poor writing lurking in this book than these reviews might lead you to believe. Having to re-read sentences 3-4 times only to find out the author himself is as confused as me just added to my frustration, and convinced me I was wasting my time with this book.

Readers who are not as snarky about syntax as I will, I'm sure, be able to derive beneficial odd and ends from this book. But, in my humble opinion, you'll be better off purchasing a book like "Eric Meyer on CSS" or "More Eric Meyer on CSS". You will become a better CSS writer by learning to emulate a Master. The examples are well written, and, in addition to achieving the specific goals listed in the beginning of each chapter, you will learn an array of other styling tricks from each chapter. Don't be put off by the books expense. $45 is quite a bit to pay for a book, but the colored fonts and the full color examples contribute to the books effectiveness very nicely. Only the relevant code is included, the updated code is in blue, and when Meyer imports entire pages into his examples, he does so in reduced size, so as not to waste space. This is the book you want to buy to master CSS.

As a person with 8 years of web design experience, I know all too well that things are constantly changing. The vast majority of those years were spent creating table-based layouts. I needed something to jump start me and help me make the switch from table-based to CSS layouts. This book served as the perfect tool.

In reading other reviews, where people complained about errors, I didn't run into this problem. I guess that's because of the way I use books. I simply took the code that Mr. Schmitt has in the book, downloaded the great examples on the book's site, and played with the code enough to gain a solid understanding of the principles that he presented.

Coupling the book's topics with other info readily available on the web and via CSS mailing lists, creating sites with CSS has been (for the most part) a pain-free experience.

My advice? I definitely recommend this book. Just take it with a grain of salt (like any other book or product) and do all you can to get the most out of it. The author definitely knows his stuff, so overall, you can't go wrong.

Designing CSS Web Pages has very good chapters on the planning and structuring of content as well as designing web page layouts using liquid designs and suspension designs. The book falls short in my opinion in the actual examples using CSS. The author doesn't take the time to discuss the how and why of using various CSS rules so that the reader gains a full understanding of the CSS standard and it's use in modern browsers. Many of the examples use pre-written designs that cannot be used outside of the context in which they are used. More discussion of the proper usage of absolute positioning as well as the correct times to use em and px would have been appreciated. Overall this is a good book, but it cannot be considered a bible on the usage of progressive CSS design techniques.

I like this book because it goes beyond the hands on and examples (of which there are plenty) and beyond the technical how-and-why-it-works stuff (which is made easy to understand here). It starts with a discussion of how and why to determine what your site needs to do and who it needs to target before you get down to the design elements. Are you selling something or providing information? Two different approaches, two entirely different styles. Helping to make that determination before plunging right into the hands-on stuff is more useful to me than many of the other how-to books I've looked over. I design and manage three websites of my own and right now they're a pain to maintain. Thanks to "Designing CSS Web Pages," they won't be that way much longer.