Dynamic Html Web Magic [Paperback]

Jeff Rouyer (Author)

Book Description

Series: Magic | Publication Date: July 1998

This is a recipe-style how-to book that walks users through a wide variety of Dynamic HTML tricks, from page layout techniques through special effects. The internal design and presentation will be almost identical to other Magic books. Step-by-step instructions for each HTML effect will be heavily illustrated. Each will include notes about which browsers support it, and each will offer variations for other creative uses of the effect.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

This is a recipe-style how-to book that walks users through a wide variety of Dynamic HTML tricks, from page layout techniques through special effects. The internal design and presentation will be almost identical to other Magic books. Step-by-step instructions for each HTML effect will be heavily illustrated. Each will include notes about which browsers support it, and each will offer variations for other creative uses of the effect.

Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: Hayden Books (July 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1568304218
• ISBN-13: 978-1568304212
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,503,358 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Save your money, don't even buy it USED, December 18, 2001

By 

M. Amburn (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dynamic Html Web Magic (Paperback)

If I could re-title this book, it would be "How To Go Out Of Your Way To Spend Four Weeks Creating in DHTML What You Could Do In One Day With Flash". That pretty much says it all.

My problem with this book is that it goes against the basic concept of software development that says "use the right tool for the job". And let's get real, the DHTML in this book is NOT the right tool. For example, consider the chapters on image animation. The author spends a huge amount of time and effort to show how to create many different graphics and write many different layers in order to glue them together with complex DHTML so that'll animate as one flying bird. That's great, but what did you really accomplish? The user has to download all of those different graphics, which considerably slows down the page. The page is fatter because of all the layers and DHTML to glue them together. And the page will render slower because the browser has to evaluate all the DHTML, load the images, and load the animation. Instead, why not spend one hour using a graphics program to create one animated GIF that loads quickly with *NO* threat of browser incompatibility. And that's the way this entire book read: I bet I can show you a somewhat-decent way of doing anything that animated GIFs or Flash can do, no matter how complex and unrealistic my implementations may be in the real world. That's great as an experiement or research thesis, but so would a book about how to type on a keyboard using only your nose and one ear. Sure it's possible, but who's going to do that?!?

This book was an absolute waste of my money. I walked away remembering why Flash and animated GIFs exist and how helpful they can be. If you're looking for a book on building Dynamic web pages, I suggest "DHTML For the World Wide Web" or "JavaScript For The World Wide Web".

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A definite NOT!, September 1, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Dynamic Html Web Magic (Paperback)

This is a really poor example of a DHTML resource. Once you oooo and aaaah at the examples, the book is relatively worthless. The author cut and paste the same information about the same JavaScript over and over into every chapter. Save your money.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great coverage, awesome graphics, August 11, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Dynamic Html Web Magic (Paperback)

This is a must-have for any dHTML developer. Even though the book is only 300 pages, it is the most descriptive dynamic html resource yet. If that doesn't convince you to buy the book already, go to www.htmlguru.com and see for yourself what the author, Jeff Rouyer is capable of. The disc included with the book has great images Jeff created on Adobe PhotoShop for you to use on your site. It also has JavaScript source code, and stylesheet files to view. From a 13 year old's perspective, 'Dynamic HTML web magic' rocks!