This essential guide for Web site designers provides practical, concise advice on creating well-designed and effective Web sites and pages. Focusing on the interface and graphic design principles that underlie the best Web site design, this book offers invaluable help on a full range of issues, from planning and organising goals to design strategies for a site to the elements of individual page design. This second edition includes guidelines on designing for accessibility, strategies for maintaining a Web site, details on using style sheets, and much more. This book grew out of the widely used and highly praised Web site on site design created by the Center for Advanced Instructional Media at Yale University (info.med.yale.edu/caim/manual/). At this site, readers will continue to find updated colour illustrations and examples to complement and demonstrate points made in the book, as well as useful and current online references.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
In 160 pages of expert instruction, authors Patrick J. Lynch and Sarah Horton put the essence of the Yale University Center for Advanced Instructional Media's wonderful online site design guide into traditional print.
The book begins the presentation of its helpful and forward-looking advice with a discussion of the overall process of defining the objectives and users of your Web site, as well as the goals you will use to measure your progress. The authors then use time-tested, traditional print concepts to clearly illustrate how to make your site interface welcoming and efficient. High-quality illustrations show how to design for overall style and professional appeal. The sections on typography and editorial style set this manual apart from many Web style guides with attention to the fine details that separate the good sites from the great.
Multimedia elements and cascading style sheets (CSS) are covered, but within the overall context of building a fine site--not with the usual hype. Media compression and delivery are addressed at a high level with concrete suggestions on formats, frame rates, and image sizes for a well-balanced approach to multimedia.
One of the great things about using this guide is that the actual site it is based on is available. You can read about a thoughtfully-written topic and then go online to see the concepts in action. Web Style Guide delivers some of the most holistic coverage of site design you'll find. --Stephen W. Plain --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
"At last, a book on the design of Web sites with the viewer in mind." -- Donald A. Norman, author of The Design of Everyday Things and The Invisible Computer
"Helpful and forward-looking advice." -- Stephen W. Plain, Web Development Editor, Amazon.com. A top-10 choice for 1999
"The Web would be an easier world to navigate if all Web designers read this book." -- Deborah Lynne Wiley, Online
"Helpful and forward-looking advice." -- Stephen W. Plain, Web Development Editor, Amazon.com. A top-10 choice for 1999
"The Web would be an easier world to navigate if all Web designers read this book." -- Deborah Lynne Wiley, Online
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
105 of 108 people found the following review helpful
By Tim Jacoby
Format:Paperback
It's disappointing to read all the negative reviews of what I think is a very good book. I think many reviewers lack the understanding of just what constitutes a style guide, so I am going to give my best definition of what a style guide is. Style guides, such as the Chicago Manual of Style, are more concerned with good journalistic practices than graphic design, covering such topics as how to treat page titles, the proper attributing of an author, how to construct footnotes, the importance of dating articles, consistent nomenclature, the consistent use of language, and other important but admittedly dry topics. In almost all cases these things will influence graphic design, and some *very* basic, but in my opinion very good, graphic design information is covered. Also covered, to a fairly high level of detail, is information on graphic format and web color, navigation, and basic usability issues. What this book does not cover, and what one should not expect from a style guide, are examples of cutting-edge design, or information on current design trends (or what many of us think of when we thing of "style"). I think all graphic designers would do well to head the advice in this book, and think that most good graphic designers already do, and are probably already familiar with the information presented here. Obviously designers that know the rules usually break them with better results than those that don't. I think most designers will appreciate this book. If you are looking for an example of really cool, award-winning Websites, try the magazine Communication Arts, especially their Interactive Annual. If you are looking for a great book to introduce you to the basics, I haven't found a better book than this.
To sum up:
"Style" means "cool" to most of us.
... Read more ›106 of 113 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
Let's get what this book is NOT out of the way: it is not a technical reference, nor is it a "killer graphic" how to. It is a style guide similar to The Chicago Manual of Style, and covers effective journalistic practices (the importance of dating material, article attributions, references, etc.)and sound layout and navigation strategies. Anyone with any experience in designing web sites will already have a working knowledge of most of what this book covers, but it is still an excellent reference for working professionals, and the best place to start for beginning designers I can think of.
Criticizing this book for hampering a designers "creativity" or use of technology seems silly to me. I've never met writers, editors or graphic designers that complained about The Chicago Manual of Style or Strunk and White. If you want to make sure your site has everything it might need to be useful to the user, buy this book. I also recommend "Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity " by Jakob Nielsen, as well as "Envisioning Information" and "Visual Explanations" by Edward Tufte.
23 of 24 people found the following review helpful
By R. A. Miller
Format:Paperback
In the last forty years, our fast-paced, future-shocked society has made it harder to comprehend the idea that certain concepts are timeless and enduring. Believe it or not, some things do not have to "improve" every year or be replaced by the latest thing in vogue. That is why enlightened people still read Plato or listen to Beethoven. That is why I am giving this book 5 stars. What it teaches you are classic design concepts, only applied to the Web. Keep it clean and useful, keep it consistent, plan it out completely before you construct a single page. And most important, design it for the intended users, not for your own entertainment. If you are new to Web design especially, this book will get you off to a great start and give you much to think about.
22 of 24 people found the following review helpful
By Anne M.
Format:Paperback
If you are just at the beginning stages of creating a web site - buy this book! It gives you a step by step plan to make sure you think about what you are doing before starting. As the books says "careful planning and a clear purpose are the keys to success in building web sites. . ."
This is not a technical manual or a book to teach design. It's a "think about what you want to accomplish" guide. If you want to feel confident you are getting off on the right foot with your web, whether you are designing it yourself or outsourcing, this book will help tremendously.
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Hardcore designers won't like this book, as they usually don't like readability or usability studies. It is a valuable basic reference for business designers for whom the point is clarity and usability, not cutting-edge design. It is valuable for starting a Web project to set the ground rules upon which design is built. I highly recommend it. Use it to avoid building another of the thousands of really bad Websites.
30 of 35 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This book provides a concise introduction to principles of Website design. I found the first few chapters, about process, interface design, and site design extremely good. But towards the end of the chapter on page design, some of the advice started to get a little questionable. For example, they explain three ways of using tables to create gutters between parallel columns, but never note what a no-no parallel columns are for Web page design, since they require the reader to scroll down, then up, then down again.
The graphics and multimedia chapters strayed a little from the concept of a Website design manual. Instead of presenting guidelines for effective use of graphics and other media, they presented detailed, somewhat technical information, about media formats and optimizing media for the Web (particularly in Photoshop). This was interesting information in its own right, but I would have liked to read more about using media effectively. One guideline they suggest is to use background images no bigger than 100 x 100 pixels, omitting advice about how to avoid the dreaded repeating border (use width = 1280).
One aspect that makes this book very different from others on the market is that it draws on primarily academic or university-related Websites for examples rather than from commercial sites. The book includes a good list of references and an index.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Web Style Guide
After initially getting the incorrect book, when I contacted them, they made it right immediately. They sent my book express mail the second time at no cost to me due to their... Read more
Published on September 12, 2009 by Madonna M. Taylor
5.0 out of 5 stars
Helpful technical guide
I purchased several copies of this book to use in conjunction with a text we're using in a 400 level Internet Marketing class. Read more
Published on October 21, 2007 by Susan F. Carder
4.0 out of 5 stars
Book doing a good job in sumaring what a website should do to work
Although obviously too basic for web developers and people working on the Net day-in-day-out because of its simplification of web design, it does work as a complete sumary of what... Read more
Published on June 9, 2007 by dangarrob
4.0 out of 5 stars
Unique features to this Guide
This is a nice source for those of us who wonder how traditional print style guidelines apply to the web. Read more
Published on July 9, 2006 by Avid Reader
1.0 out of 5 stars
Um...I'd read another book instead
Good information. Hard to read and presented boringly -- is that a word? Other books contain the same information. Not horrible, just not great.
Published on March 29, 2006 by Ash Buckles
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not too helpful...
If you're fairly inexperienced on the internet, and you don't know what "Classic three-column layout" means, then you should buy this book. Read more
Published on June 21, 2005 by Matthew Nielsen
5.0 out of 5 stars
A concise and structured functional overview of Web Design!
In less than 220 pages, this book covers the functional aspects of Web design in a well structured and concise manner. Read more
Published on October 27, 2004 by Jean Ducharme
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Great Resource
Whether you're new to web design, an old hand, putting together a personal or hobbyist site, or charged with developing a website out of thin are for an employer or organization,... Read more
Published on August 4, 2002 by Terrance H. Heath
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great book for starters!
I recommend this book to anyone who is a designer for the web or publishing industry. I bought this book to start as a class requirement. Read more
Published on April 4, 2002 by "edtheleo"
5.0 out of 5 stars
A huge amount of energy and knowledge in less than 200 pages
This book is not only dealing with Design principles. It deals with everything, including the biggest problem of almost 30% of all the websites in the world - fading away. Read more
Published on February 26, 2002 by Ramil Mastiyev
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