Book Review: CSS Mastery

8th August 2006 | permanent link
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You might have noticed that I keep a farely up to date list of what I'm currently reading, and as you might have guessed, I like to read quite a bit. That is why this might become a constant section on this page. OK enought chatter, lets get down to business.

CSS Mastery, written by Andy Budd of Clearleft fame, is by far one of the best CSS books I've recently had the pleasure of reading. Written for the bit more savvy web developers, wich means the author does not beat about the bush and gets down and dirty fairly quick. CSS is explained in much more detail, clearing up quite a few cloudy topics, well at least for me. The author realizes that while CSS is a relatively easy technology to learn, it is that much more difficult to master. Especially with so many different browsers, wich is why the book also contains two whole chapters devoted to finding and fixing bugs as they arise. As you might have guessed, most of the bugs and fixes revolve around Internet Explorer, from older versions to Mac versions.

The final two chapters of the book are case studies of two sites hand crafted by high profile web developers Cameron Moll and Simon Collison.

Summary of content

Chapter 1: Setting the Foundations
Chapter 2: Visual Formatting Model Recap
Chapter 3: Background Images and Image Replacement
Chapter 4: Styling Links
Chapter 5: Styling Lists and Creating Nav Bars
Chapter 6: Styling Forms and Data Tables
Chapter 7: Layout (chapter availible for download)
Chapter 8: Hacks and Filters
Chapter 9: Bugs and Bug Fixing
Case Study 1: More Than Doodles
Case Study 2: Tuscany Luxury Resorts

Conclusion

I belive the quote on the cover of the book says it all.

Andy Budd not only clearly understands and is able to teach the underlying technologies and contemporary methods used in CSS design, but his knowledge of cross-browser support issues is unparalleled.

- Molly E. Holzschlag

High praise, and rightly so. In my oppinion CSS Mastery should be on the required reading list of each and every web developer. You are bound to find at least a few things you didn't know before.

tags: books, css, web standards, xhtml