Customer Reviews

Laura Lemay's Web Workshop: Designing With Stylesheets, Tables, and Frames

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

 

 

I am an experienced technical writer (10 years of software documentation) creating my first web page. I needed to learn tables and frames quickly. After patiently following the instructions (from Chapter 1 on), and manually entering the code from the samples provided in this book, I have learned enough html to do a page from scratch, and can implement tables and frames. In fact, I re-designed my web page twice-first using tables, then frames.

It's not a perfect book... I think I found all the typos in the code... but, searching for the errors reinforced my debugging skills. And nothing takes away the thrill of viewing the page and having everything click into place. Instant gratification!

All I can say to those who didn't like this book, is their learning styles must be different from mine. For me, it worked. And, I think manually entering the code (except for cheating on the Greeked text) did a lot to reinforce the concepts. This is a hands-on project... I am not a programmer, although I have had some programming classes. I certainly couldn't have grasped the elements by speed reading through the code. And, the graphics helped re-assure me I had everything in the right place.

This is my second Lemay book, and I can assure you I will be checking out the other titles.

I read a lot of books and am always looking for something new. After I purchase a book I like to come to amazon to make comments. My comments are usually positive. I have found there are a lot of good books out there. When I came across this book I was looking for something to help me with these exact issues: style sheets, frame and table. I wanted a book that explored design rather than concept and I thought I would find it in this book. I read all the comments regarding this book and think that someone is doing a good job of trying to build hype for the book. First they trash it then they praise it. Then they trash it then they praise it.

In all honesty I must say this is the first book I have read recently that was really disappointing. Truth be told only a single chapter is this book has anything to do with style sheets. That chapter is chapter 3, "In Vogue: Cascading Style Sheets." This chapter dismisses style sheets as something that isn't quite there yet stating most browsers don't support style sheets while dismissing the fact that Internet Explorer 3.0/4.0 both support style sheets and so does Navigator 4.0 which does/will account for 90% of the browsers out there. More often than not the author discourages the use of style sheets yet at the same time invites you to try them. Strange to say the least. Beyond this chapter, there are other chapters that mention style sheets in passing, but nothing truly useful. By the time I finished the book, I was wondering what happened to the rest of the style sheet discussion. The author only touches on about a third of what you can do with style sheets leaving out two thirds of the discussion. The book is made worse because the author never even mentions the omitted material. For a 600 page book with style sheets as the first item in the title, this book does not measure up.

The book spends a lot of time on case studies of Web sites. There's hundreds of pages of nothing but source code and screen shots. Truth be told most of this is not explained. It is just presented. In summary Designing With Style Sheets Tables and Frames is a big book that really doesn't cover a lot of ground or present any new material and someone has done a good job of trying to build hype ala Create Killer Web Sites so definitely look before you leap.

I bought the book. I already work with basic html daily at my workplace. I entered the code of the first 5 lessons in BBedit and ran the BBedit editor. What a mess!!

tags are not closed, <tr> and <td> tags are not closed. The editor's mistake finder was running out of space. Did they bother to check and edit their work before the book went to print? Did they create a new version of HTML? Confusing to say the least! In the chapter about designing with side to side tables, they forget to mention that the space between the tables will stretch wider with larger monitors, which renders the effect unstable. I really wonder if the book was reviewed and edited before it went to print. What a pity, it could have been great.

I keep this book handy at all times. I learned how to construct tables and frames, just from this book alone. The methodology is very conducive to learning. You start with the outside of your code, and work inward. It is a great way to learn, because you are literally building your "code" and can see it take shape. This is essential when learning tables, because you need to be able to envision your whole table, and know what the parameters are going to be, before you start building.

The chapter on frames is very easy to understand, and once you work through it, you will have the concept down pat. One of the more tricky aspects for novices learning frames is targeting - and Lemay explains this well. The CD is somwhat lame, but you really do not need it anyhow, as the book is thorough enough as it is.

I bought this book last winter of "97". I was glad there was a book designed for Tables and Frames but after working on my web page I found this book to be somewhat confusing. I know it is rated advance but would have like to see more visual examples to go along with the HTML code. Also the code was written in a way where it was not easily readable.It was arranged in sections. I was hoping to see all of it together. On the good points I did learn more terminology on HTML

As an aspiring web site designer I find this book to be a great resource in my future developement.It cuts through all the technical mumbo jumbo thatcan be quite confusing to the novice. It seems that the people who gave bad reviews on this bookshould have read an expert level book. They should have looked at the scale on the back cover and noticed that this book was <targeted> for the casual to advanced and not expert. I have not finished the book yet and feel that I have all ready gotten my money's worth.

Tables, style sheets, and frames are sometimes difficult to master, especially in the ever-changing environment of the WEB. Laura Lemay has again found an expert in this field, Molly Holzschlag, and together they begin to unravel the mysteries of these elements. Molly's expert descriptions and Laura's witty commentary draws the reader in and makes a "dry" topic interesting. Their presentation style, use of examples, Q&A sessions, as well as the companion CD quickly get the reader involved and using these exciting and valuable design elements. This book, although written for an intermediate level, is probably written for an intermediate-advanced level, due to some assumptions made by the authors.

Lemay books are generally overhyped trash and this is no exception. I friend told me to mentally transpose the e and the a next time I shop for books to ensure I don't make the same mistake yet again. Out of 600 pages about half are filler, background stuff and other junk, that won't help you at all. Which leaves about 300 pages of which half are pictures and worthless examples. Toss out the 100 pages of fluff in the appendix and you are left with about 50 pages of stuff that you may be able to use. In the end you have to ask yourself do you really want to shell out $39.99 or whatever Amazon charges for a book that will leave you frustrated and feeling ripped off even after you search out the aforementioned 50 pages that may be useful

For a book that is supposed to help you, this one sure doesn't. Reminds me of a paint by numbers set my children would use. The only problem is that it has about as much detailed instruction as well. This book is an example of hand holding at its peak. The author walks you through the process of creating VERY basic tables, frames and stylesheets.

Mixed in with all the hand holding are discussions that few beginners will understand. Sort of like the author has multiple personality disorder and one personality wrote for beginners then the second personality went back and added all sorts of stuff that wasn't explained to be spiteful. The book is written for beginners yet assumes so much that only an expert will have any idea of where the author is going with specific points. The only problem is that if you know the basics already you do NOT need this book.

As in her last book, Molly has once again created a masterpiece of text which those of us who are also authors, can truly appreciate as well as the readers. Attention to simplicity was so keenly delivered with her consistent finesse in style.

Our firm has shown this book to good number of readers from various levels of web experience. With but one exception, there was nothing but aplause for the style and creativity shown in this book. There is no amount of splash with color, just plain simple and direct ilustrations with a CD for reference to all illustrations provided. Four of our readers who reviewed the book expressed the fact that they were able to apply information from the very first chapter within the first 10 minutes of reading the book! "I was so impressed with the section of frames." "Until now, I was reluctant to create frames due to my lack of understanding oh how the structuring of frames is done." "Within minutes of reading the chapter on frames I developed my first frames page!" stated one of our reviewers.

I question the ethical credibity of some of these reviews I see here by people who do not even provide their email address for feedback. They slam the author's efforts rather than posting feedback in a constructive manner to improve a particular publication they dislike.

I my ownself have learned an abundance of information from these books by this author and stand behind her work 110%. Those of you who know who The Mad Monk is, you know too well that I tell it like it is. If it is a poor creation, I will let my readers know, but in a "constructive" manner of critique.