Customer Reviews

FrontPage 2003 (The Missing Manual)

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The thing I like most about "FrontPage 2003 : The Missing Manual" by Jessica Mantaro is how well this book is laid out. There are many times when a book is not intelligently planned out ahead of time and you are dealt with the obstacle of having to search chapter through chapter to find what you are looking for. Upon opening this book you will immediately find this to not be the case. Separated into 18 chapters with a helpful index at the end, this book covers all the important topics:

01. Creating a basic web site
02. Adding and editing text
03. Working with Hyperlinks
04. Image manipulation and insertion
05. Creating tables
06. Using frames
07. How Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is used
08. Using layers
09. Learning DHTML
10. Learning about site structure
11. Using themes and templates
12. How to test your site
13. Publishing your site for the world to see
14. Collaboration tools available
15. Using forms in your site
16. Working with databases
17. Communicating with a database
18. Integrating FrontPage with other Office apps

Simply stated, this is a fantastic reference manual for anyone that needs to learn FrontPage 2003 or wants to get more out of this application that has made so much progress the last couple of versions. FrontPage used to be a basic, clunky app that wasn't the best tool around, but of all the 2003 Microsoft Office updates, this application is probably the one most worthy of an upgrade. The new version of FP truly shines over the rest and it will be a helpful companion by your side while you are working on your corporate or personal web site.

A fantastic manual for learning and/or reference that truly should have been in the box. Expertly written by an experienced technical writer who brings her years of experience to the table, making it easy for the everyday John/Jane Doe to become a FrontPage 2003 pro!!

***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

FrontPage used to have a reputation for not being for "real website designers". Maybe it still does; reputations are tough to shake. If so, it's undeserved. Let's face it - FrontPage is a complicated program that can produce truly professional-looking websites. I recently upgraded from FrontPage 2000 to 2003 and immediately thought, "Uh oh, I'm gonna need some help in understanding this." And this book provides it.
On-line help is great if you know precisely what you are looking for - just fire up the index and type in a word or two. But if you want to learn how to use a product you are almost always better off buying a good book. (Why is that?)
Anyway, I really like the way this woman writes. She has a knack for presenting numerous and potentially-boring technical details in an informative and conversational way. She points out what's good - and lacking - about the product itself and related web technologies (e.g. HTML, tables, CSS). She takes you on a soups-to-nuts website development journey that not only describes how to get started and incorporate progressively-sophisticated features, but also covers things like structuring, testing, publishing, and working with a database.
All in all, the cover says it best: This book should have been in the box.

I was initially attracted to this book by its title. I have often been frustrated and even angry by the poor quality of manuals that come with so many products. It's then a burden to locate an appropriate, well written manual. Some are too basic; some too advanced. At least for me, this one was written at the right level and with a pleasant style to read. I had first read parts of Frontpage 2003 for Dummies and Microsoft's Step-by-Step book. They were okay, but this book was better. This book seemed to have more substance without a lot more heft. And it's nice to read a computer manual with a critical perspective and a slightly irreverant tone--something that is missing from the Microsoft series. The book wasn't perfect. I had trouble, for example, following its chapters on layers and cascading style sheets. Something seemed to be missing from these chapters. I don't exactly know what except that these chapters didn't fulfill their stated purpose. All in all, though, an excellent book.

Solid end-to-end coverage of the features of FrontPage. The chapters are organized in generally the way that you use the program. Starting with basics of creating a page, going through styles, images, uploading, site management, then getting into dynamic sites. Definitely worth it for beginners with FrontPage.

Absolutely worth EVERY CENT!... The website lingua in this book is exceptionally UNDERSTANDABLE and no mumbo jumbo! I have already created my business' new home on the web... and already have people asking me to help them do theirs. THE SECRET is in THOSE PAGES.. found in FRONTPAGE 2003 - The Missing Manual! But, hmmmm do I tell them? I could add this service now to MY SERVICES... *smiling* but, seriously, my son has been working with FrontPage, at his school, and put me on the valuable software. But I had to make two options... listen to him dictate to me, or learn the software myself... and master it, MY WAY! Went online, and I know by the GRACE of MY GOD.. I was led, to this book... and YOU'LL be seeing FIRST hand, SOON..., MY CREATIVITY with a QUICK READ BOOK, like FRONTPAGE 2003 - The Missing Manual. Jessica Mantaro - APPLAUSE goes out to you!!! You made my hectic days MUCH easier, by making this web-designing a breeze for me... now I can concentrate on my business and CREATING WHAT I DO BEST... enjoying my business' profits!

First things first: if you want to get any *real* work done in FP 2003, buy this book. Those of you who have work to do, feel free to ignore the rest of this review.

As someone who has worked for nearly twenty years in high tech (including five for Microsoft, so maybe I should say I worked in high tech for fifteen years and went to meetings and watched my back for another five), I decided recently to purchase FrontPage 2003 and was appalled to find a leaflet enclosed, rather than a manual. What the @!$%*#?!? Now I will be the first to admit that Microsoft has earned an honest reputation for obfuscation, overcomplication and completely redesigning products while ignoring the problems in the ones that have already shipped, but...not putting a manual in the box for this software is downright cruel. Most regular folks do not understand that Microsoft hides the coolest and most useful features from them because a) Great minds within the company assume the customer will hurt themselves when presented with an advanced feature, b) because these are the parts of the product most likely to generate calls to tech support in Bangalore and c) M$ products are actually created by tens of thousands of small, inefficient yet tireless rodents who enjoy nothing more than building a complex series of tunnels, so meaty functionality is almost always counter-intuitively hidden behind a maze of dialogs.

And a special love letter to Bill and/or Ballmer, if you're reading this, wake up and smell the espresso...ordinary people can and DO read manuals, as do world-weary geeks. Front Page is actually, against incredible odds, a good product.

The decision not to include a manual was apparently somebody's 'great idea' of cost-cutting. Bad, bad decision. Shame on you, big billion-dollar company, for shafting the customer once again. This is a move in the wrong direction. Next time you reorg the company, aim for hiring some real talent (rather than cookie-cutter drones), putting the customer first (instead of lip service) and cutting some of the layers of overpaid management fat rather than short-changing the people who paid earnest money for, and are struggling to work with, your software. You're looking more like Enron every day.

I bought the "Absolute Beginers Guide..." first. It wasn't 'absolute' enough for me. The layout of this book was much more logical and comprehensive.

THE MISSING MANUAL IS REALLY "THE BOOK THAT SHOUD HAVE BEEN IN THE FP BOX." CONGRATULATION TO JESSICA MANTARO. AN EXCELENT MANUAL. I RECOMMEND, GO AHEAD.
MARCELO, FROM: CURITIBA - BRAZIL.

This is the second manual I have purchased for FrontPage 2003. This book is clear, concise, and easy to follow. I appreciate the clarity for an amateur like me.

I love the series The Missing Manual. I never really cared for FrontPage 2003 for some reason so I always created my websites on Dreamweaver. Once Microsoft came out with FrontPage 2003, I decided to give it a shot. I looked around for some books to help me and found that nothing was really that spactacular. Then I came across the Missing Manual Frontpage 2003. I looked up up online and read each review before I went to the bookstore to check it out. I bought the book and I am glad that I did. This is defintaly the best book on the market for Frontpage 2003.