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| Bulletproof Web Design: Improving flexibility and protecting against worst-case scenarios with XHTML and CSS (2nd Edition) (Voices That Matter) | 
 enlarge | Author: Dan Cederholm
Publisher: New Riders Press
Category: Book
List Price: $39.99
Buy New: $22.43
You Save: $17.56 (44%)
New (46) Used (7) from $22.43
Avg. Customer Rating:  106 reviews
Sales Rank: 10308
Media: Paperback
Edition: 2
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 312
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 7.4 x 0.6
ISBN: 0321509021
Dewey Decimal Number: 005.7
EAN: 9780321509024
ASIN: 0321509021
Publication Date: August 19, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com Review
Book Description
No matter how visually appealing or content-packed a Web site may be, if it's not adaptable to a variety of situations and reaching the widest possible audience, it isn't really succeeding. In Bulletproof Web Desing, author and Web designer extraordinaire, Dan Cederholm outlines standards-based strategies for building designs that provide flexibility, readability, and user control--key components of every sucessful site. Each chapter starts out with an example of an unbulletproof site one that employs a traditional HTML-based approach which Dan then deconstructs, pointing out its limitations. He then gives the site a make-over using XHTML and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), so you can see how to replace bloated code with lean markup and CSS for fast-loading sites that are accessible to all users. Finally, he covers several popular fluid and elastic-width layout techniques and pieces together all of the page components discussed in prior chapters into a single-page template.
Guest Reviewer: Jeffrey Zeldman
 Modern web design is user-centered, accessible, and standards-based. In other words, it's completely different from the stuff we did in the 1990s. There are two vital aspects to designing with web standards:
(1) understanding why
(2) knowing how
Know-how is what Dan Cederholm has in spades, and in this updated edition of his essential text, he shares that knowledge with humor and clarity.
Dan's is one of the smartest minds in CSS and HTML. He is internationally known as a deep and innovative coder. But his background is in design and production, working on real-world sites for no-nonsense businesses like Google, ESPN, and Fast Company, Inc.
This grounding in practical user interface design and daily production issues makes Dan a great teacher of CSS, because he never loses sight of the things designers want to do (not to mention the things designers' clients and bosses demand of them).
From multi-column layouts that stay crispy in milk, to maintaining fine control of web fonts and sizes without alienating users: just about every problem a modern web designer faces is examined, with solutions ranging from good to better to best.
This second edition includes everything you need to know about taking Internet Explorer 7 into account. Little else has changed. And that's as it should be, for this book is a classic. It belongs on every web designer's shelf.
-- Jeffrey Zeldman, author, Designing With Web Standards 2nd Edition
About the Author
Dan Cederholm is a Web designer and author living in Massachusetts. He's the founder of SimpleBits, a tiny design studio. A recognized expert in the field of standards-based Web design, Dan has worked with Google, MTV, ESPN, Fast Company, Blogger, Odeo, and others. He embraces flexible, adaptable design using Web standards through his design work, writing, and speaking. Dan is the author of two best-selling books: Bulletproof Web Design (New Riders) and Web Standards Solutions (Friends of ED). Dan also runs the popular weblog SimpleBits, where he writes articles and commentary on the Web, technology, and life. He also plays a mean ukulele and occasionally wears a baseball cap.
Product Description
No matter how visually appealing or content-packed a Web site may be, if it's not adaptable to a variety of situations and reaching the widest possible audience, it isn't really succeeding. In Bulletproof Web Desing, author and Web designer extraordinaire, Dan Cederholm outlines standards-based strategies for building designs that provide flexibility, readability, and user control--key components of every sucessful site. Each chapter starts out with an example of an unbulletproof site one that employs a traditional HTML-based approach which Dan then deconstructs, pointing out its limitations. He then gives the site a make-over using XHTML and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), so you can see how to replace bloated code with lean markup and CSS for fast-loading sites that are accessible to all users. Finally, he covers several popular fluid and elastic-width layout techniques and pieces together all of the page components discussed in prior chapters into a single-page template.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 101 more reviews...
 The most useful Web design book I've ever owned November 1, 2005
100 out of 109 found this review helpful
I'm a Web designer for one of the big three office supply chains in the US. This book is never more than an arm's reach away from my workstation, and I consult it almost daily. Unlike other XHTML/CSS books that examine what's theoretically possible, Cederholm's book focuses on foolproof solutions to common Web design issues. It is engagingly written and beautifully lain out. With this book and a basic knowledge of CSS, you'll be creating pages that not only look great, but make the Web a better place. This is the new Web bible. Buy it, read it, live it.
This book is the one September 9, 2005
69 out of 70 found this review helpful
If you are just coming over the the standards-compliant light, this book is the best for showing real, working techniques. Great examples that work. A cookbook. Cederholm won my heart and my mind with "Web Standards Solutions" and this book builds on that theme. The man is a good writer, easy to understand, and he makes compelling and lucid points.
Cederholm's presentation is great: he states a problem or goal, then examines several different ways of solving it. The examinations are just a paragraph or two long -- short and to the point. He points out the strengths and weaknesses of the various solutions, then concludes with a "best practices" solution. Finally, he builds on and refines the best practices solution to deliver a finished piece. When there is no clear-cut best way, he lays the cards on the table and let's you decide what is best for your specific application. He talks about the compromises between pixel-perfect layouts and fluid layouts and how each effects design and useability issues.
It is not stand-alone because a good reference is still useful to have by your side.
 Good book but suffers from a MAJOR problem July 5, 2006
63 out of 100 found this review helpful
This is quite a good book with a tremendous amount of good advice for those creating web sites, but the book suffers from one major problem.
The entire crux of the book centers around using keyword sizes for text. The author claims that visually impaired people must be able to increase font size in the browser and your web design must be built around this one need. It's a good thought but I wonder how many people do this.
People who are visually impaired will usually choose an audible screen reader or a screen magnifier - rendering keyword sizing unimportant. Users can use their own stylesheets to control font sizes.
In order to accomplish a reasonable design using keyword-sized text, the author relies upon one of two CSS browser hacks. The problem with this is that it is neither bulletproof, nor standards complient and very likely to break with the next round of browsers released.
The reality is that many sites use pixel based font sizing not just to control the look and feel of the site, but to make sure information is displayed correctly. I am all for separating presentation from semantics, but there is an overlp between font size, color, and placement and semantics. NO matter what some of the standards Nazis will have you believe - deign carries meaning.
That being said, the book is not without it's merits. Web developers should be moving towards more accessible, semantically marked up html and correct CSS. The real problem with web standards is that they aren't standard. As a developer I choose to stay away from hacks.
You can learn a lot from this book, and probably implement it for smaller, less data-intense web sites.
 Great - but only for beginners February 1, 2006
39 out of 47 found this review helpful
I don't want to knock the book too much because I greatly respect the author and am an avid reader of his terrific website simplebits.com.
However, what none of the rave reviews here have told you is that this book is really for newbie designers. If you have been in the business for more than a year or two, this stuff should pretty much be second nature.
I have been working as a web designer for 6 years, and made the change over to table-less designs - seperating design from content - a couple of years ago. I am always looking for ways to do things better, and was hoping this book would give me tips to take me to the next level.
But rather, instead of taking me to the next level of web design as I had hoped, all I got was the same stuff I have been reading on ALA and other sites for months - or even years!
Yes, the book is beautifully designed and very well written. Yes, it is divided into short easy-to-follow chapters with step-by-step instructions. Yes, Dan Cederholm is excellent in presenting his thoughts on paper and comes up with some quite clever solutions to common problems we designers face every day.
The problem is that all of the information in this book has already been posted in articles around the web. So if you follow his blog, and/or blogs from other leading designers, you really don't need this book.
I bought it based on the overwealmingly positive reviews here at Amazon. However, after completing the book in less than 3 hours, I hadn't read one single idea or solution that I havn't already been using in my designs. (Granted, I learned many of the techniques I use today from wonderful and helpful sites such as Dan's simplebits.com, so it is only fair that he gets some of my money. I only wish I was aware of exactly what I was paying for.)
My advice is to save your money and go to mezzoblue.com, csszengarden.com, alistapart.com and simplebits.com where you will find all you need to know to be a great web designer.
Beware - You need to ALSO know Photoshop October 5, 2006
24 out of 49 found this review helpful
I was disappointed - not because the CSS stuff is poorly presented, because it's on the better side of average, but because to learn this book's stuff, or try to emulate some of the examples, requires a knowledege of Photoshop. For example, you need to know how to create an image with a gradient applied to a canvas, or to create a 1 pixel transparent row within an image - something that your average person may takes weeks to learn on his own. Photoshop is not all that intuitive to just grab a copy and simply create an image that the author uses.
And the author's website to support the book lacks the images we could use - just to get through with the book's examples.
By the way, the images the author uses do not even specify their size, so even trying to recreate these images augments this inherent problem.
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