I'm currently reading 2 or 3 books, among other things. Two of them happen to be the same publisher O'Reilly... while the last one is SitePoint. Head Rush Ajax and Head First Design Patters and Build your own site the right way using XHTML and CSS So far I'd recommend all of these books. All three of them teach through example and none of the pages are complete boxes of text, you see how the code effects the page.
The book on XHTML and CSS is definitely for beginners, I skipped the first chapter and a half. It goes so far as assuming nothing, even that you know what a browser does. I almost put it down at that point but I kept with it. I taught myself CSS online just looking at what others had done and feel that to make sure I was staying within standards and all a basic book might be a good idea. And this book does what I want. The writing is entertaining and I can almost here a British dude narrating it! Though that's more to do with the fact that I heard about the book from a British podcaster but, that's later.
On to the Head Rush/First books. I like the way they are very graphical and example driven. You lean what you need as it is needed and each example involves more plus what you have used in the last chapter. I also think it's great for anyone who has problems with short attention span. There are little quizzes along the way and it's a very practical way of learning instead of the theoretical approach you might get in other books.
As you can see I'm on a webdev kick. I think it's really interesting and plan on applying what I"m learning to some forms and a site that I help that is currently all in asp. I think Ajax would be great for it and even help keep down user error.
I'm always open to other book recommendations, in pretty much anything.Labels: ajax, books, css, review, tech, web design |