CSS Cookbook, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

by Christopher Schmitt (Author)
Key Phrases: liquid columns, page elements, personal site, Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator, Times New Roman (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
As the industry standard method for enriching the presentation of HTML-based web pages, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) allow you to give web pages more structure and a more sophisticated look. But first, you have to get past CSS theory and resolve real-world problems.

For those all-too-common dilemmas that crop up with each project, "CSS Cookbook" provides hundreds of practical examples with CSS code recipes that you can use immediately to format your web pages. Arranged in a quick-lookup format for easy reference, the second edition has been updated to explain the unique behavior of the latest browsers: Microsoft's IE 7 and Mozilla's Firefox 1.5. Also, the book has been expanded to cover the interaction of CSS and images and now includes more recipes for beginning CSS users. The explanation that accompanies each recipe enables you to customize the formatting for your specific needs. With topics that range from basic web typography and page layout to techniques for formatting lists, forms, and tables, this book is a must-have companion, regardless of your experience with Cascading Style Sheets.

About the Author
Christopher Schmitt has been working on the Web since 1993. He is the principal of Heatvision.com, Inc., a new media design firm, and resides in Orlando, Florida. Christopher speaks frequently about web design at conferences including South by Southwest Interactive and Web Design World. His books include "Designing CSS Web Pages" (New Riders), "Professional CSS: Cascading Style Sheets for Web Design" (Wrox), and "CSS Cookbook" (O'Reilly).

Product Details

• Paperback: 538 pages
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media, Inc.; 2 edition (May 11, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0596527411
• ISBN-13: 978-0596527419
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #78,304 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #31 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Programming > Languages & Tools > XHTML
  #39 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Programming > Languages & Tools > CSS
  #45 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Graphic Design > CAD

• This is item 10 in The O'Reilly Cookbooks Series.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

66 of 66 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting CSS solutions, but a little thin, September 9, 2004

By	E. Wuehler (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: CSS Cookbook (Paperback)

I think I'd generally agree with the previous positive reviews. You should already be familiar with CSS, JavaScript and HTML - this is not a CSS starter book. It's more geared toward start to finish answers for common CSS questions, most of which I found I could easily adapt to my level of understanding. There is an in-depth description about how to create a very nice looking calendar with CSS (using HTML tables) which I liked a lot. However, for me personally, I will probably stick with O'Reilly's CSS: The Definitive Guide.

I'm sure it was done for monetary reasons, but it would have been nice if the figures were in color - or at least the figures supporting the elements that deal with color. It was tough to distinguish between shades of grey or follow the arrows with the words "blue" or "green" on one end pointing to an area. I know, I know, picky picky. :) So - while I'm being picky... :) The foreward mentions "...compiling hundreds of CSS recipes into this single book" - but by my count, there are only 89 Problem/Solution/Discussion sections (aka recipes). I would like to have seen "hundreds of CSS recipes", which would have provided greater variety to the solutions.

29 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a very good, practical guide for putting CSS to use, August 25, 2004

By	R. Sobkoviak "DHTML mentor / former radio per... (Chicagoland, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: CSS Cookbook (Paperback)

O'Reilly's other books on CSS tend to be more for reference and learning, but this book, by Christopher Schmitt, contains good, practical advice for putting CSS to use. And as a bonus, this book covers the brand-new CSS 2.1 conventions. Like other "Cookbook" tech books, there are plenty of real-world cases and blocks of code that designers and developers can use or adapt in their own situations. There are plenty of "Hello World" examples that will be useful to those new to CSS, but there is some advanced material, too, for those at intermediate levels looking to spread their wings a bit. This volume bookends quite nicely with the "Eric Meyer on CSS" books.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars CSS Recipes only half-baked, September 25, 2004

By	Alan C (Melbourne, Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: CSS Cookbook (Paperback)

Of the various recipe-style books about CSS that have appeared in recent times, this one is probably the best. It covers a variety of realistic requirements, from "web typography" (large first letters, highlighted first lines, fancy pull quotes etc) to several different kinds of menus and multi-column page layouts. Most of the recipes are short but they are also largely self-contained, making them very quick and easy to use. This format makes me prefer Schmitt's effort to some comparable works, such as Eric Meyer's two colorful volumes, Eric Meyer on CSS and More Eric Meyer on CSS.

That said, however, potential buyers of the book should be warned that it has some glaring omissions. While Explorer-like collapsible menus and tab-style horizontal menus are explained, there is no recipe for drop-down or "fly-out" menus. The chapters on table styling and print stylesheets are rather thin, and the chapter on Hacks and Workarounds makes no mention of Internet Explorer's conditional comments, which, being deliberately-designed browser features, seem like more durable tools than the parsing bugs on which most hacks are based.

These omissions might be understandable if space was at a premium, but at 252 pages, the book is short compared with most other titles from O'Reilly's cookbook series. And one wonders why, if useful things had to be left out, the author could still find room for a Javascript-based technique for producing that most annoying of web phenomena, blinking text.

In the end, I would still recommend the book for people who find that they have to use CSS occasionally, rather than on a daily basis. But the buyer should still be prepared to spend time trawling the web in search of solutions to many problems.