Designing With Web Standards 384
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.
You mean... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Mmmhmm (Score:3, Insightful)
So, where's the web site? (Score:4, Insightful)
future-proof? no such thing (Score:2, Insightful)
How do we know the W3C won't change the standard AGAIN in three years?
Re:Mmmhmm (Score:2, Insightful)
Read the book title again. And again, until it sinks in. Flash is not a standard, it's a propriatary technology.
If only the boss could understand the virtues (Score:5, Insightful)
Zeldman.. Hmmph! (Score:2, Insightful)
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.
Re:future-proof? no such thing (Score:2, Insightful)
It is still HTML 3.2 compliant.
It may not follow the latest standard, but a browser should still be able to render it correctly.
W3C standards are not changed. New ones are added.
Re:future-proof? no such thing (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: not true (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:web standards are really only half the battle. (Score:2, Insightful)
Here's to reading books from start to finish (Score:3, Insightful)
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?
You need to read this book especially then (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The only standards on web code is.... (Score:1, Insightful)
Second, unless you were using just basic HTML then there was no chance you got full compatibility out of Netscape 4. It barely supported any CSS. It was, and still is for some of us, and nightmare to write for.
Re:Ummm (Score:5, Insightful)
First, a reminder that this is 2003, not 1998, which was the year IE4 and Netscape4 were introduced. Since then, Mozilla has come, and with it Netscape 6 and 7. Also, we've seen the arrival of Konqueror (and Safari) and Opera.
Netscape 4 is dead: don't worry about it beyond getting your sites to still be legible in it.
Gecko based browsers, Konq, and Opera all do very well with W3C standards.
IE, however, has not had a major rendering revamp since version 4. The biggest change was for IE6, which is actually less compliant than previous versions. Sure it fixed some things, but broke many more.
Among web designers I know, IE is quickly gaining the hatred that had previously been reserved for Netscape4, because they know that NN4 is irrelevant, and the hatred has to go somewhere: the least compliant browser out there... IE.
Now, why is IE the least compliant? Because MS doesn't see the need to make it compliant. They have their precious market share, which is all they care about... not the users, not the developers which must coddle to IE because it works the way MS sees fit, not the standards bodies which MS continually ignores while attempting to participate.
The only way to break IE and move to standards is to use them, and explain to users why sites don't work: it's not the site's fault, it's the browser's.
Given all this, most people who have a clue about W3C standards would say you're doing your development backwards. You'd probably save a lot of time if you coded to the standards first, then hacked up the code for IE.
Re:The back cover (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The back cover (Score:2, Insightful)