Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver CS3 [Paperback]

Stephanie Sullivan (Author), Greg Rewis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 12, 2008 | ISBN-10: 0321508971 | ISBN-13: 978-0321508973 | Edition: 1

In Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver CS3, authors Stephanie Sullivan and Greg Rewis demonstrate how to use Dreamweaver CS3 and CSS together to create highly individualized, standards-based layouts. Through hands-on projects with visuals, the book gives readers an in-depth understanding of Dreamweaver's 32 CSS-based layouts (new in Dreamweaver CS3) and their application, enabling every user of Dreamweaver to learn CSS effectively and easily.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Recognized as a Dreamweaver, accessibility, CSS and XHTML expert by the worldwide Web community, Stephanie Sullivan frequently presents at conferences, where her insightful, down-to-earth, and entertaining sessions garner top ratings. Stephanie's tutorials and educational articles appear regularly on sites such as Adobe's Developer Center. Greg Rewis is the Worldwide Senior Evangelist for Web Tools for Adobe and spends over 200 days a year on the road, talking with customers, giving product demonstrations at trade shows and seminars, speaking at industry conferences, and leading specialized advanced training sessions featuring Adobe's Web Tools product line.

Product Details

• Paperback: 360 pages
• Publisher: New Riders Press; 1 edition (April 12, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0321508971
• ISBN-13: 978-0321508973
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #947,788 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #13 in Books > Computers & Technology > Graphic Design > Web Design > Fireworks

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars But Not For Me, June 23, 2008

By 

Conrad J. Obregon (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver CS3 (Paperback)

Dreamweaver is the software that eases the construction of websites by providing for "what you see is what you get (almost)" construction. CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is a web building tool for separating content and format in web site design, making the updating of sites easier and taking up less memory space on the host computer.

This book attempts to teach the reader how to use Dreamweaver to create sites that use CSS. After a chapter laying out the fundamental rules for CSS, the authors provide a number of tutorials including building a new style sheet (the repository of the CSS rules), migrating a table-based layout to CSS, using liquid and then elastic CSS layouts, and finishing using a combination of Dreamweaver and Spry, another web design tool, to create a site.

The book says it's aimed at the Intermediate/Advanced level and based on my experience, I guess that I'm at the Beginner level. I've constructed table-based websites with Dreamweaver that work well and look good. I understand the fundamentals of CSS. But this book left me in the dust. In the first tutorial, the authors took me step by step through the process of using Dreamweaver, telling me exactly which menus to use and which submenus to fill in, and though I had to refresh my memory from time to time by looking at (X)HTML and CSS texts, I was able to complete the tutorial. But as the authors moved to later chapters, the instructions on using Dreamweaver became less and less specific, so that by the half-way mark, the reader was being told what code was desired without any handholding through the menus. For an occasional user like myself, it was just too much and I soon found myself flipping back and forth, and using menus even though I had no idea why I was making the selection. My problems were compounded by the fact that these are long tutorials, and I sometimes had to look back hundreds of steps to find a place where I had made an error that had an effect on the present step.

I don't want to suggest that I got nothing from the book. I got enough from the first tutorial and the early sections of subsequent tutorials to edit my main site to incorporate some CSS rules. I'm not certain it was worth the effort for me. I've spent months working my way through this book.

If you are experienced with coding and understand CSS and all of Dreamweaver's menus, and you want to use Dreamweaver to speed up the construction of CSS, this book may be just for you. For the less experienced user like me, a beginner's guide to CSS and Dreamweaver is needed.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book on CSS, April 20, 2008

By 

Kerry D (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver CS3 (Paperback)

This book really does a great job explaining how to build websites using CSS and Dreamweaver CS3. I've bought a couple of other books and this one is by far my favorite. The layout of the book provides step-by-step instructions snd includes many "color" screen shots so you can easily see that you are keeping-up with the instructions. I highly recommend this book if you want to learn how to design websites using Dreamweaver CS3. Here's the Table of Contents:

Chapter 1 - Laying the CSS Groundwork

Chapter 2 - Using the Fixed, Centered Starter Pages

Chapter 3 - Migrating a Table-based layout to CSS

Chapter 4 - Using the Liquid CSS Layouts

Chapter 5 - Creating a More Cocmplex Design with Elastic Layouts

Chapter 6 - Building a Gallery Site with CSS and Spry

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars GoLive User Learning DWCS3 CSS, May 15, 2008

By 

Linda King - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver CS3 (Paperback)

I highly recommend this book!

I've been a GoLive user since the early days, I think version 2 or 3. I've also owned and upgraded Dreamweaver since version 3. I've attempted to master DW countless times over the years. It is a different program from GoLive. On top of the difference between the two programs, those of us who operate from the right brain have additional challenges when it comes to code.

I've got quite a large collection of Dreamweaver books. This is the first one that has actually gripped me and started to make sense of it all. I love the learning style, not to mention the layout and design is appealing. Lots of white space. This not only helps me stay focused but allows room for notes.

I'm not saying the challenge is over. I'm still facing a challenge with advanced or complex divs. But this book is making sense of it. I particularly like the way concepts are broken down and explained. I also find the insight on learning The Natural Flow of the Document to be helpful.

Greg Rewis and Stephanie Sullivan both have a love and appreciation for GoLive, which I think helps break down the communication barrier than we GoLive users often seem to face with Dreamweaver users. Matter of fact, Stephanie started with GoLive and Greg was one of the founders of it.

I've been in touch with Stephanie by email as I've had a couple of roadblocks I needed to overcome. Stephanie has been very responsive, friendly, and helpful.

I'm still working my way through the book, but I can say already that it is worth the investment for me.