Learning Web Design: A Beginner's Guide to HTML, Graphics, and Beyond [With CDROM]

Web sites have come a long way since the first graphical browsers came out in the early '90s. We're seeing fancy pages made with XML, Java, PHP, CSS, Javascript, XHTML, and more. No doubt this has left web page designer wannabes feeling left behind and lamenting it's too late to learn how to design web pages.Jennifer Niederst reaffirms that it is not too late. Her previous and best-selling book, Web Design in a Nutshell has helped many including me take their web design skills to the next level plus it's excellent as a reference book. However, her students were clamoring for a book that is more basic and introductory than the Nutshell. She calls Learning Web Design: A Beginner's Guide to HTML, Graphics and Beyond her "prequel" and correctly so.This is the book I wish I had when I first learned HTML. Even someone, who has known HTML and understands graphics, this book is still useful. Beginners learn about GIF, JPG and when to use which format. Intermediates are reminded the difference between adaptive, selective, and perceptual color palettes.Niederst includes steps and screen shots for performing different activities in the more popular web design, animation, and graphic software products. I experience an annoyance in my early days of web design - the halo effect on graphics in which I added transparency. Again, this book saves time in trial and error of correcting problems by providing the workarounds and tips.Of course, the nuts and bolts of creating Web pages are covered, but the book doesn't stop there. The last section shows you how to bring it all together and create pages similar to the professional ones out there using HTML and graphics. Finally, learn the secrets of making rounded edges on boxes, 1-pixel square graphics, non-repeating background tiles, and pop-up windows.Every designer has to deal with browser bugs and the tips will help you work through the buggers. Another bonus is the chapter on Building Usable Web Sites, an often-neglected step in many web sites. Here, you're introduced to key principles for designing the user experience and ensuring you have a navigable web site.It's impossible to cover everything Web design in one book. However, if you come across a web page and wonder "How did they do that?" then go to the last chapter with the same name and find your answers. Stop telling yourself it's too late and get started with this resource. Intermediate designers use this one as a reference and memory jolter of how to do specific web design tasks.

"Learning Web Design" by Jennifer Niederst is an excellent intro to HTML and web design. The book takes the reader gently through how the Internet works, how web pages are loaded, and how web pages should be designed before giving a lesson on HTML. Niederst then takes the reader through a sampling of topics such as graphics and frames, highlighting the do's and don'ts of web design.In my opinion, I recommend this book if you are:A complete newbie to the web but wants to make web pages the right way.A programmer who understands the basics of HTML but does not consider him or herself a designer.You will also need a dose of patience, and I also recommend you follow along her lessons with your computer with a basic text editor software like Notepad. I would also recommend checking out "Web Design in a Nutshell" by the same author for a slightly more advanced and in-depth treatment of web design and "HTML and XHTML: The Definitive Guide" for a complete treatment of how to write HTML.Lastly, Niederst doesn't cover JavaScript or CSS in this book: it is strictly an intro for beginners on the fundamentals of HTML and web design.Highly recommended.

I had bought other HTML books, including some that promised to be simple, but they merely confused me. I felt defeated. Then I saw a copy of this book, read a few pages, and immediately bought it. I have been delighted. First, it is very readable-clear, logical, and thoughtfully illustrated with useful examples. Second, it is organized in a way that truly helps neophytes. It begins by explaining some general points that page designer needs to know. Then it gets more specific, and then finally it begins explaining the mechanics of creating a page. The order in which topics are introduced allows the user to put up a simple site and then continue to improve on it. I found that satisfying, because I could get something up and running quickly, which was a thrill, and then I could improve on what I had done. The web links are very helpful. For instance,the chapter on color provides a link to color charts, so readers can see the colors they will be working with. This book has made me believe that I will eventually not only design web pages, but also web pages that load quickly, are easy to use, and that can be read on most browsers. I plan on buying another book by this author as soon as I finish this one.

Jennifer Niederst is just the person you want to write a book like this. Many readers of this page will already know who she is, but since this book is aimed at absolute beginners a short introduction may be in order.Originally a graphic designer, in 1993 Niederst became one of the very first web designers when she worked on the world's first commercial website (O'Reilly & Associates' Global Network Navigator, which is no longer in publication but you can see samples of it on Niederst's own website if you want; write me for the URL). Since then she's been one of the best-known web designers around and she's written other books on the topic -- notably _Web Design in a Nutshell_, which I highly recommend you get as a followup to this one (but wait for the new second edition, due out in October 2001). Since Al Gore didn't even _invent_ the Internet until 1993, that makes Niederst the nearest thing there is to an "old-timer" in what is, after all, a pretty new profession.Niederst has said in interviews that this book is the one she wished she'd had to give her web-design students. It won't take you long to see why; it's painstakingly thorough and detailed, just the ticket for somebody who has never written a speck of HTML code before and is a little fuzzy on just what this "Internet" thing is.But it's also helpful to people at other stages of knowledge. The coverage (mostly HTML and graphics, with a little bit of appetite-whetting overview at the end about more advanced techniques like cascading style sheets, JavaScript, and XML) is so complete that if, like me, you learned this stuff on your own, it will fill in _lots_ of gaps in your education. (Over the last year or two I've gotten pretty proficient with text but I knew almost zilch about graphics until I read this book.) And even if you already know all this stuff cold, this book will probably still be handy as a reference and a source of helpful advice.Then, too, it's also a handy rough-and-ready guide to the sorts of application software you might want to acquire if you're getting seriously into web design. Niederst not only introduces the major players among authoring tools and graphics packages, but steps through her examples more than once to show you how they work in, e.g., Dreamweaver and GoLive.The style is breezy and chatty but with no loss of accuracy. You'll find out why Niederst thinks "web design is cool" and you'll learn some of "Jen's pet peeves" (e.g. spinning-globe graphics and rainbow bars), but you'll also get a thorough and accessible introduction to the nuts and bolts of web design.If you're just getting started on the creation of web pages, this is the book to use first. As I noted above, you'll probably also want to get Niederst's _Nutshell_ book as a sequel. After that, you'll be well qualified to decide what else you need.

This book is another example of one I wish I had four or five years ago when I was first learning how to do web pages. The book first off is visually appealing with lots of diagrams and code examples interspersed with the text. I was tempted just to grab the HTML examples without reading any further! However, what makes the book an even bigger treat is Ms Niederst's casual but very complete writing style. She takes the time to explain a lot of different concepts and ties them all together. Throughout the book, the topics all tie together beginning with Chapters 1 through 5 (the "Getting Started" section), where Niederst explains "web basics," Chapters 6 through 11 (the "Learning HTML" section), where she explains topics like formatting text, links, tables, and frames. The book's last two major sections cover areas like creating and modifying graphics and even briefly explain advanced topics like Dynamic HTML and Cascading Style Sheets. By the book's end, you have an excellent general understanding of web design.Not only that, but the way the information is presented, the book also is a good reference text for those times when you run into problems. And anyone who has done web sites knows that pretty quickly you'll run into a problem while designing a site. There are a few sections in the book that deal with troubleshooting web design problems. Ms Niederst comments at the back of the book that reading this book is "a lot like sitting in my classroom." I suspect her students learn quite a bit about web design. So will you after reading this book.