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Designing With Web Standards
from the aren't-standards-banners dept.
| Designing With Web Standards | |
| author | Jeffrey Zeldman |
| pages | 456 |
| publisher | New Riders |
| rating | 9/10 |
| reviewer | Carl Anderson |
| ISBN | 0735712018 |
| summary | An excellent guide on designing a Web site with the latest Web standards |
Jeffrey Zeldman is one of the best technical writers whose work I've had the pleasure of reading. He is obviously well-educated with regard to the subject, and his passion for the work really shows through. Still, he never comes across as a zealot -- his style is even-handed, thoughtful, and easy to comprehend.
The first part of the book ("Houston, We Have a Problem") is the reason I give a rating of "9" rather than "10." Zeldman spends a perfect length of time on background and history of Web standards (why they're here, and what designers did before they emerged). However, this section seems to suffer from what many technical books suffer from: a case of "We'll see this soon"-itis. While this is perhaps unavoidable in such a treatise, it is nonetheless apparent. Still, it's only marginally distracting.
The meat of the book comes with "Designing and Building." Zeldman first talks about modern markup, then explains the variations on XHTML (i.e. Strict, Transitional, Frameset) and how each ought apply to your design. Here we see more theory than practice, though, but this is welcome -- it lays the foundation for a more cerebral look at distinguishing markup from design. Once Zeldman explains the nuances of that topic, we moveon to the redesign of a Web page constructed with a hybrid table/CSS design complete with all the excellent effects we hope to see in modern pages.
After working through this redesign, Zeldman talks in more detail about the CSS box model (and the browsers that break it), typography, and some of the quirks that Web designers must deal with. Next he touches a bit on Web accessibility--a must-read for everyone, whether you think so or not.
While Zeldman isn't incredibly thorough here, he doesn't need to be--it's a book on Web standards, after all, and this chapter serves to show how accessibility can still be achieved within those standards. He also suggests a couple of other books for more information.
Finally, Zeldman walks the reader through a redesign of zeldman.com, basically as a hands-on summary of the book, and as a guide for future projects. Also included is a "Back End" (i.e., appendix) showing some excellent information about each major browser.
Too often, a book or Web site on XHTML/CSS will dwell only on the "how"--this book shows the "how" and still explains the "why": Here's how you set up an id'ed element; here's why we do that, rather than using a class. It's already opened my eyes to many things I thought I had a handle on, but now realize that I only knew in a cursory fashion.
So, ask yourself: Do you want to design a Web site that will work for everyone, regardless of their platform? Do you want to make sure your Web site is future-proof? If so, you need this book.
You can purchase Designing With Web Standards from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
The back cover (Score:4, Informative)
You can get off the merry-go-round.
It's time to stop living in the past and get away from the days of spaghetti code, insanely nested table layouts, tags, and other redundancies that double and triple the bandwidth of even the simplest sites. Instead, it's time for forward compatibility.
Isn't it high time you started designing with web standards?
Standards aren't about leaving users behind or adhering to inflexible rules. Standards are about building sophisticated, beautiful sites that will work as well tomorrow as they do today. You can't afford to design tomorrow's sites with yesterday's piecemeal methods.
Jeffrey teaches you to:
* Slash design, development, and quality assurance costs (or do great work in spite of constrained budgets)
* Deliver superb design and sophisticated functionality without worrying about browser incompatibilities
* Set up your site to work as well five years from now as it does today
* Redesign in hours instead of days or weeks
* Welcome new visitors and make your content more visible to search engines
* Stay on the right side of accessibility laws and guidelines
* Support wireless and PDA users without the hassle and expense of multiple versions
* Improve user experience with faster load times and fewer compatibility headaches
* Separate presentation from structure and behavior, facilitating advanced publishing workflows
Re:The back cover (Score:4, Informative)
(http://www.link2communications.com/)
XHTML & CSS are tough sometimes, and Zeldman's realistic approach to transitioning to a standard web language is refreshing - he's not a zealot.
I hope more web designers will jump on board this movement - if we ever want to get paid really well and escape the image of the teen with frontpage coding his uncle's website we need to embrace these kind of ideas.
Re:The back cover (Score:4, Funny)
*sniff* So long, Slashdot, we'll miss you.
Re:The back cover (Score:5, Informative)
(http://limpet.net/mbrubeck/)
Re:The back cover (Score:4, Funny)
(Last Journal: Monday May 17 2004, @07:10PM)
or at least he thinks he is!
Mmmhmm (Score:2, Funny)
(Last Journal: Wednesday June 09 2004, @07:46AM)
Re:Mmmhmm (Score:4, Informative)
(Last Journal: Tuesday September 14 2004, @08:18PM)
Flash probably runs faster and has more support, plug-ins and editors on most computers at the moment but SVG is catching up (also SVG supports compression which is cool so it can match flash in file-size).
So basically the book would talk about SVG if it talked about any vector/animation system.
(And without trying to sound like a troll:
Flash = Cheap Hack, SVG = Potentially Structured Nirvana)
Re:Mmmhmm (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.ancar.org/)
Ladies and gentlemen, we now have proof of the existance of the Anti-Christ, here on Earth! First, the user name "illuminata" is too Luciferian to be denied. Next, note the Slash UID 668963 containing "the Number of the Beast". Finally, we have the demonic message itself!
Prepare for the Apocalypse, for it is surely at hand! Slashdot has spoken!
Related resources (Score:5, Informative)
http://zeldman.com/externals/
Re:Related resources (Score:5, Informative)
(http://pe.ter.dk/)
A site worth visiting is http://www.csszengarden.com/ - having lots of alternate stylesheets.
I'm currently working on a project with a designer w/clue. Everything regarding looks and design has moved into stylesheets. All I have to do is to structure the data in suitable divs/blocks (with regard of continuity for the simple text-based browsers).
You mean... (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://www.xposse.com/)
Re:You mean... (Score:5, Informative)
(http://phroggy.com/)
<link rel="stylesheet" href="/main.css" type="text/css">
<style type="text/css"><!--
@import url(/not-netscape4.css);
--></style>
Any browser except Netscape 4 will load both stylesheets, so the standards-compliant code in the second one will override the Netscape 4-specific code in the main one.
So, ask yourself (Score:2)
(http://slashdot.org/~GillBates0 | Last Journal: Tuesday July 10, @04:36PM)
YES!!!
Do you want to make sure your Web site is future-proof?
ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!
If so, you need this book.
oh
A good follow-up book is... (Score:5, Informative)
First Book is Better (Score:4, Informative)
(http://www.carotids.com/)
A Review Can Be Found Here [codekit.com]
Although I am not very good at web design... what I have learned, I learned from this guy. He rocks.
Davak
The only standards on web code is.... (Score:5, Informative)
(Last Journal: Thursday June 05 2003, @09:57AM)
Standards? What standards? (Score:3, Funny)
Check out the css Zen Garden... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.csszengarden.com/ [csszengarden.com]
So, where's the web site? (Score:4, Insightful)
(http://www.networkmirror.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday July 05, @04:34PM)
future-proof? no such thing (Score:2, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Friday September 10 2004, @12:41PM)
How do we know the W3C won't change the standard AGAIN in three years?
Buy It Link (Score:3, Informative)
If only the boss could understand the virtues (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.devinmoore.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday May 24 2007, @06:16AM)
Zeldman.. Hmmph! (Score:2, Insightful)
(http://cyphertube.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday May 21 2006, @11:10AM)
I like standards. I like accessibility and usability. I hate Zeldman's site. It's like hypocrisy in motion. If I lectured on web design and make sites usable, I might improve my site from where it is.
Zeldman makes life tough on older viewers, disabled, and newbies. His labels are quippish and arrogant, his colours too similar, fonts too small and not resizeable in the most prominent browser out there.
Take a look around and you'll probably find better books on standards. Or, if you must, take the gospel of Zeldman and water it down with a little Jakob Nielsen.
What about CMS solutions? (Score:5, Interesting)
task of setting up a web site are going to be looking at ways to not
have to do it from scratch. There are a lot of CMS (Content
Management Systems) out there, some free, some not. What *I* really
need is an O'Reilly book about CMS that helps wade through all the
stuff that's out there right now so the reader (me) can make an
informed decision about which way to go.
I did a quick check of the O'Reilly web site and all their CMS info
revolves around XML and Java. This does not help me.
Someone get this guy a GF (Score:4, Funny)
(http://slashdot.org/~Greedo/journal | Last Journal: Thursday February 12 2004, @10:27AM)
Maybe he should take a break from writing and get out to the bar a bit more.
Geesh, don't be silly... (Score:5, Funny)
web page
Voila! You have now created the perfect web page in ten seconds!
Microsoft takes care of all of the standards stuff so you don't have to worry your pretty little head about that. No really...don't worry.
No...don't do "View Source"
NO! Don't! EVERYTHING IS OK!! STEP AWAY FROM THE KEYBOARD
Standards make life easier for everyone. (Score:2)
(Last Journal: Tuesday March 09 2004, @01:55AM)
I've found that standard compliant web pages tend to be more interoperable between browsers (sadly, there will still be differences). This makes it easier for you since you won't have to work as hard to find ways to make your site look good in several browsers. It makes it easier for viewers because they can use the web browser they like the best.
The only problem is that there are a lot of people who still browse on old hardware that has Netscape 4.x on it. Netscape 4.x tends to mangle CSS pretty badly.
This book is excellent (Score:1)
(http://www.startsiden.no/)
The first historical overview mentioned is very nice, but can be skipped. However I feel it is an important part of the book, and gives weight to the arguments on why using the standards way later on. It also gets designers new to the web up to date on what has passed, and highlights mistakes that were made (so we can possibly avoid them again).
Otherwise I agree fully with the author, the book is indeed both well written, has a nice flow and really gives good arguments why this is the right way, and how to do it the right way. The authors attitude is never arrogant, and the solutions are always practically oriented and work well in real-life (unlike a lot of other books on HTML and CSS).
My take on this book is that if you want to read one book on web design this should be it. Of course after having read this book you probably change your mind and start looking for other literature by the same author
Perhaps... (Score:2)
Granted, some parts of the W3 standards are worth breaking (wrap attributes in textrea inputs, for instance), but c'mon.
J
Here's to reading books from start to finish (Score:3, Insightful)
Standards aren't standard (Score:2)
(http://harry.blogdns.com/)
Unfortunately, very few sites out there that work in all browsers correctly are compliant.
I guess it's a toss up: have a little validator button proudly displayed somewhere on your site and have a few display errors in Internet Explorer or have a messily coded site that is slow, but works.
Too bad nobody follows standards (Score:2)
(Last Journal: Tuesday September 27 2005, @05:01PM)
Another unfortunate tidbit...I work for one of those places. I know the aggrivation of trying to get compliance through to people who just won't listen. *sigh*
Usings standards to save size (Score:5, Informative)
(http://www.coyote.org/~jonas/)
Imagine having to tell our users (many of which are using GNU/Linux or Macintosh) that our web site only works reliably in Windows with Internet Explorer 6.0 and above. Just because a PR agency can't develop web pages. It's impossible. I had to do something about it.
So when I implemented the layout for our department (scheduled to go live later this month), I scrapped everything they had done. I took a printout of their page (as it looked in Internet Explorer) and marked up what colors and fonts they had used.
Then I set down and wrote the same thing using XHTML/1.0 Strict and CSS1. This was about two days work, but the finished result now validates using w3c's validate tools, and it works reliably in all browsers I've managed to try, all the way back to Mosaic and Netscape 3, with or without images (yes, Lynx, Links, w3 and other text browsers work very well indeed too).
Not only did I get the pages to validate. By using CSS, I was able to get rid of several images they had been using with their design. The overall size of a page, including graphics and CSS, now weighs in at about 35 kbytes. This is compared to around 120 kbytes with the proposed code.
And even better, most things can be cached by the browser (CSS code and images). The only thing that needs reloading when you hit subsequent pages is the dynamic XHTML code, which weighs in at around 5 kbytes, compares to 40 kbytes in the proposed code.
Now, I think our students will like us. This result is even better than the pages that we have today. They render quickly and effortlessly even on old equipment or on extremely slow links.
I havn't been able to convince the faculty to make my code the "default" yet, but they might get the idea once people start noticing that our pages load much more quickly than the rest of the faculty pages.
So, using standards isn't always about making things render nicely in all browsers. It gives you a while heap of nice side effects that isn't worth sneezing at.
Stop IE Now! (Score:2, Offtopic)
(http://www.object404.com/)
Microsoft declared IE6 SP1 as the last standalone browser for lame-ass reasons. The truth is, they're only truly integrating IE into the next Windows Operating System for the first time, to prove their 'point' in the anti-trust case that they couldn't remove the browser from the OS.
If IE really was such an integral part of the current slew of windows versions, how come it takes ridiculously long to load when you enter a URL into the address bar of an explorer window, and that the people at LitePC [litepc.com] was able to remove IE from the Windows operating system?
Bunch of liars. Guys, help educate everyone and have people switch to either Mozilla [mozilla.org] or Opera [opera.com] -> Makes Windows boxes more secure and gets rid of the need to buy those stupid superflous pop-up killers. (you can pick up viruses or spyware just by surfing a maliciously coded website and hitting the wrong button)
None of my family and friends use IE anymore after I educated them about the dangers of IE.
Web Standards? (Score:3, Funny)
*cough*
Standards are about more than multiple browsers (Score:3, Informative)
(http://slashdot.org/~Infonaut/journal | Last Journal: Tuesday July 31, @02:22PM)
But Really doesn't everyone have IE (Score:2)
Can't wait till we need to apply for visas for our Passport access to other countries.
I don't mean to be rude.. (Score:1, Insightful)
I'm not saying your review is wrong or bad, but maybe get some experience in what you're doing before preaching to others?
And Slashdot's score... (Score:2, Redundant)
URI:
Encoding: iso-8859-1
Doctype: HTML
Errors: 407
Revalidate With Options
:
Show Source Outline
Parse Tree
Validate error pages Verbose Output
* Note: The URI you gave me, , returned a redirect to
* Line 71, column 115: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "alloc_id"
* Line 71, column 129: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "site_id"
* Line 71, column 139: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "request_id"
* Line 161, column 62: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "group_id"
* Line 161, column 76: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "atid"
* Line 241, column 74: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "tid"
* Line 241, column 156: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "mode"
* Line 241, column 184: cannot generate system identifier for general entity "threshold"
This page is not Valid HTML!
Line by line of errors
---
Nice!
407 lines of errors...
Speaking of standards... (Score:2)
(http://goldspider.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Friday March 18 2005, @10:54AM)
What's it called when someone tells you do do something, and then does the opposite?
Oh yes, that's hypocrisy.
here's one thing to make sure you don't to (Score:2, Interesting)