And The Oscar Goes To: “The Silence Of The Blog”
There are strange and funny things that happens when Google suddenly REALLY likes your blog/site. In the midst of doing some refinement on Elvgren, Taft, iRent, and a yet to be announced FileMaker product, suddenly everyone in the US needs help managing and getting up to speed with their new iPod. We’ve been able to keep up with the demand (read: I have every computer I own working on automatically ripping and loading iTunes) but it’s left little time for the finer pleasures, such as reading and the aforementioned design activities.
That being said, when it comes to reading, I’ve been engulfed in Dan Cederholm’s “Web Standard Solutions”
(Link to Amazon)
Dan is of fame, knowledge, fast cars and power, alll through his personal and professional site SimpleBits.com
The Review:
Alas, as I struggled in between the step of finding Dreamweaver 2004’s interface for CSS management somewhat clunky and writing all of my own CSS code in BBEdit, I continually found authors referring to Dan Cederholm’s book. Simultaneously, the birth and arrival of Taft and Elvgren was painful, and this book thoroughly explains how to work around browser shortcomings and the full reasons behind many CSS usages. It’s kind of like a big thought bubble appearing above your head and you realize the epiphany that comes with it. I haven’t completed it, but as of half-way through, I’ve ear-marked too many pages for constant reference. To quote one of the Amazon reviewers:
The chapter breakdown: Lists; Headings; Tables Are Evil?; Quotations; Forms; … Phrase Elements; Anchors; More Lists; Minimizing Markup; Applying CSS; Print Styles; CSS Layouts; Styling Text; Image Replacement; Styling ; Next Steps; Index
The chapters follow a common format… A topic is introduced, and three or four different methods are shown on how to accomplish the task (like lists). Each method is explored for pros and cons, with the goal of finding a solution that puts emphasis on semantic meaning and clean markup. This is followed by an “extra credit” section that pushes past the basic topic and starts to show some more unique ways to use CSS for appealing page images.
For one, the tone is conversational in nature. You’re not being lectured to or scolded for not adhering to perfect and exact standards (or opinions). The book is also not a reference manual as such. It’s a practical guide on how to use CSS to get the job done and give yourself a solid design that will work for multiple types of browsers. Throw in a little humor along the way, and this book becomes one which you find yourself picking up repeatedly.
The sign of a good book for me is one where I’m using the book either before or during my review. Based on a project I’m currently coding, I’ve already started to memorize certain page numbers I keep going back to. This book will definitely secure a spot on the bookshelf at work, and will be closely guarded to make sure it doesn’t disappear.
Certainly, if you do get the book, you won’t regret it.
