First. Who is the book for?
The book states that it’s for “anybody with a basic knowledge of HTML and CSS” and experts. I’d say it’s more for the first case, but I’ll expand on that later.
There are lots of useful tips and tricks, that I’m sure you’ll use over and over, explained in a solid and easy to understand way. The fact that the examples can be seen online and that there are files that can be downloaded is great.
Second. It’s a second edition.
When I read the first edition, I was just starting to work with CSS, and CSS was still a bit of a mystery to me. I remember reading some things that I thought to be pure magic and that seemed very complicated, but now I realise they are used by any good CSS coder. So, at the time, the book opened my eyes to those techniques and to the possibilities of what could be done with CSS.
Content.
The book covers subjects from the beginning to a more advanced level.
It starts with the importance of semantic HTML, how to set good foundations. It takes a very brief look into microformats and HTML5 as well.
Then it moves onto selectors, with some more advanced and CSS3 ones — but it doesn’t go very deep into that area to be honest.
It explains the box model, which is rather important, very well. Liquid and elastic layouts.
Some more advanced techniques, like sliding doors and even multiple backgrounds, which is quite refreshing. Opacity and rgba colours.
There are some clever uses for the :target pseudo-class and attribute selectors. Some webkit proprietary code like gradients and reflections.
It also explains how to style lists and navigation. I would have liked to see a larger section for definition lists, because there’s only a small section and it sounds a bit negative (or even dismissive) and I don’t think it makes them justice.
There are some negative comments on CSS frameworks. Which I frankly agree with.
A good introduction to the IE layout issue. Some common browser bugs and how to fix them. And how to work with graded browser support.
Then on the examples, at certain points they can be a little repetitive, but there’s an interesting discussion about website widths, a brief example of using jQuery, which is rather nice.
Conclusion.
In conclusion, as someone who had already read the book, reading it again was good, as there are always things that you forget or that you weren’t aware of, even though my experience now is completely different, and I can be a little more critical about it.
If I could change something in the book, I think I’d change the naming of CSS3 — in the specs it’s always mentioned with no spaces, and in the book it has a space between the second “S” and the number “3”. I know it sounds nitpicky, but it’s rather annoying for me, for some reason…
Also, there are some mentions to browsers that are already dated, even though the book is fairly recent (like “Safari 4 beta”, which is already out of Beta). But that’s just something that happens in our industry — things move too quickly. I’m just being nitpicky again.
So, have I learned anything from this second edition? I did learn a few things, but not much. I already use or know most of the techniques. But would someone starting to work with CSS learn anything from the book? Definitely yes. I used to always recommend the first edition whenever someone asked me for book recommendations, and I will keep recommending it with the second edition. It’s a must-have.
