Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

I am not a frequent web developer so I need books that explain things clearly and that let get to what I need quickly. Eric Meyer's book is perfect for that. It is very well written, contains good examples with clearly written and commented code. It is a perfect book for learning and reference.

If there are any cons, I guess the "screenshots" with text are a little fuzzy, but it's a minor problem.

I highly recommend this book on CSS.

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

This book is decidedly miss-titled. It is not definitive and it did not guide me greatly. The most obvious flaw is the lack of one single external CSS stylesheet. Honestly, doesn't inline style defeat the purpose of CSS? I'm no expert, and perhaps I'm way off base, but the book was very little help because it failed to provide the real world external style sheet context. I also felt that the book simple failed to cover critical content.

Provide meaningful context with external style sheets and it would be much, much better. Also frustrating was its failure to define technical terms/jargon used in descriptions, and its failure to include critical concepts in its index. I would provide an example (I can't recall a single one), but the book was so worthless that I left it at home (I am on the road, on contract). This last is its most stinging endictment; I brought obsolete books by Colin Moock, just in case, but not CSS the difinitive guide.

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

Cascading Style Sheets - the Definitive Guide -- sets out to fulfill a very important function: to explain the W3C specifications for CSS -- that is, to explain how Cascading Style Sheets works, in minute detail.

However, while the author's conceptions and language are up to the task, the book isn't. It has serious flaws: the absence of any warning that a good deal of its contents just don't work in Internet Explorer; the frequent introduction of terms prior to their definition; and some really abysmal illustrations (O'Reilly's trademark minimalist graphics, which may work well in some contexts, but which frequently misinform or just plain fail in this book). These flaws create endlessly frustrating obstructions, so that the reader who cares has to expend twice the time and energy pursuing alternative sources, while he or she who doesn't will just abandon the task.

This is a real shame, for - as far as I know - there are no other texts out there that try to cover the same territory. Were O'Reilly and the author to tackle these flaws in earnest, this could be an amazing book. But my own experience was very frustrating -- so much so that I was left feeling resentful at such an abuse of my good intentions, time and energy.

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

I've been working with CSS for years, but still will usually find a design I like and modify it, rather than coding from the start on my own.

I've seen graphical guides for CSS and I've seen very complete descriptions of CSS elements, but this books a great combination of the two. For every styling element mentioned in this book, there is at least one diagram to help understand how it works. I found this extremely useful for floating elements. There are 9 given situations where blocks are floating in the page. For each example, a supporting diagram shows where the element is put in the code of the page and where it actually will display based on the floating attributes and what other blocks are already on the page.

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

Besides using www.w3.org as a reference this book will be my guide for future reference. It is clear, pragmatic and easy to understand. Like so many O'Reilly books cleanly laid out and even handed in it's critisisms. It really is a definitive guide.

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

Simply, this book was great. I mean, it was put in such easy terms that almost anyone could understand the criteria of CSS. It had some very nice diagrams(like the Z-Axis model and the CSS Box model). Yes, I gave it a 5, BUT let me list some areas that need a little work on for the third edition, or what should have been in better depth inside this edition.Chapter 5: Fonts. This needed more detail. They only talked of a couple fonts and didn't list any for the more Novice-sided reader.

It would have been nice of the author to provide little exercises and scenarios for practice. But then again, this isn't Learning PHP 5.

Well, it had some very nice features, like a full-fledged CSS example and a quick-reference in the back. This book is great if you would like to master "The Art of CSS".

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

This book is easy to read and makes me able to apply CSS-techniques to my website. I can strongly recommend this book for (basic) understanding of CSS and also as a reference.

I gave it only 4 out of 5 "Stars" because of chapter 10 - Floating and Positioning. This Chapter definitely needs at least one complex example because the theoretical background is not enough to be able to design/layout a webpage with CSS.

So i was looking for some examples in the web and found several good sites. Two of them i'd like to present here as an addition to the book:

http://webreference.com/authoring/style/sheets/layout/advanced/

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/flexiblelayouts/

Especially the first example is very intersting with its encapsulated divs.

Enjoy!

Comments about oreilly Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition:

Eric's writing style is smooth, easy, and just so chock full'o goodness. I really like his use of "real world" examples which are always superb.

Eric also does a fabulous job of explaining a lot of the "why" certain rule react they way they do in different browsers. He also doesn't just leave you hanging wondering how to fix it. He gets right to the meat of the problem in the normal flow of of his explanations. Have questions about accessibility? Eric has got you covered. Want to make your site stand out from everyone else's? Eric has you covered. There is just a plethora of goodness to be gleaned from this book.

At the same time though, Eric explains things so that they are easy enough for the beginner to graps and complex enough that even an experienced CSS designer can find useful information. I find it an invaluable reference tool.

So, for anyone who wants to learn CSS based design techniques whether beginner or expert I think you just can't go wrong with Eirc. Just want to add some monster chops to your CSS Skills, then this is the book for you. And if you're just curious to know what CSS is all about this book will answer that as well. You'll be glad you bought this book.

I know I am.