Stylin' with CSS : A Designer's Guide (Paperback)
by Charles Wyke-Smith, 288 pages, New Riders Press (April 26, 2005), ISBN 0321305256

Product description from Amazon.com: Stylin’ with CSS teaches you everything you need to know start using CSS in your web development work, from the basics of markup of your content and styling text, through to creating multi-column page layouts without the use of tables. Learn how to create interface components, such as drop-down menus, navigation links, and animated graphical buttons, using only CSS – no JavaScript required. Discover how to design code that will work on the latest standard-compliant browsers, while working around the quirks of the older browsers. With a mastery of CSS, your web design capabilities will move to a new level, and everything you need to know to get your started and build your skills is right here in this book. You’ll be stylin’ in no time!

My comment: I am about to order this book as a lot of people on some of the forums and mailinglists I frequently visit and participate in have the warmest recommendations of it and all say it is very good.

Eric Meyer on CSS – Mastering the Language of Web Design, by Eric A. Meyer, 322 pages, ISBN 073571245X

Product description from Amazon.com: There are several other books on the market that serve as in-depth technical guides or reference books for CSS. None, however, take a more hands-on approach and use practical examples to teach readers how to solve the problems they face in designing with CSS – until now. Eric Meyer provides a variety of carefully crafted projects that teach how to use CSS and why particular methods were chosen. The web site includes all of the files needed to complete the tutorials in the book.

My comments: This is a good book with lots of hands-on examples with before and after and the code used to achieve the resulting looks. It is not for the beginner though who knows nothing about CSS or a person who is not comfortable to go into the html code to write CSS code or to apply divs etc. A lot here is a follow-me, but not all is explained. To get full benefit of the book you still need to first learn the basics about what is a div and an id and what are selectors and the like and how to apply them. I still warmly recommend the book. Even by just following the examples you learn a lot.

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Eric Meyer More on CSS (Voices that Matter), by Eric A. Meyer, 304 pages, ISBN 0735714258

Product description from Amazon.com: How to use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) to design professional-looking documents for online publication. Aspects of CSS that affect position, color, typeface, and other design elements are covered, as are the special considerations that relate to navigation tabs and images. A number of case studies (including a look at the author's contribution to the Zen Garden design project) make ideas clear.

My comment: I'll order this book as soon as I can afford it. if it is anything like the first one (see above), then it will be very useful. As I've understood it this book is written in the same way as the first one and very hands-on, with real examples.

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Designing with Web Standards, by Jeffrey Zeldman, 436 pages, ISBN 0735712018

According to Amazon.com Jeffrey teaches you to:
• Slash design, development, and quality assurance costs (or do great work in spite of constrained budgets)
• Deliver superb design and sophisticated functionality without worrying about browser incompatibilities
• Set up your site to work as well five years from now as it does today
• Redesign in hours instead of days or weeks
• Welcome new visitors and make your content more visible to search engines
• Stay on the right side of accessibility laws and guidelines
• Support wireless and PDA users without the hassle and expense of multiple versions
• Improve user experience with faster load times and fewer compatibility headaches
• Separate presentation from structure and behavior, facilitating advanced publishing workflows.

My comments: I've read a bit over half the book and hav ejust entered the pratical second part of it. The first half is more about examples an arguments in favour of separating content from design. The book is very easy to read, has good descriptions and lots of examples of what is described and can really teach you a lot about web standards. I like this book and have learned a lot from it. I've still got to read the more practical chapters in it but I've had a lok at them and they seem very useful. I warmly recommend this book which has become something of a standard book to read for anyone who wants to learn about CSS.

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The CSS Anthology: 101 Essential Tips, Tricks and Hacks by Rachel Andrew, 376 pages, ISBN 0957921888

Product description from Amazon.com: A practical guide on CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) for professionals and novices, that can be used both as a tutorial and read cover-to-cover or as a handy and practical reference book to common problems, solutions and effects. The Question and Answer format makes it easy for readers to solve their problems and learn more about common pitfalls and workarounds.

My comments: This book is very useful. All user-reviews at Amazon.com are raving about it. It contains a lot of easy to follow examples and tricks that actually work in rela life, that is in the various browsers. The descriptions are easy to understand and apply to your own pages. Extremely useful. I warmly recommend it.

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HTML Utopia: Designing Without Tables Using CSS by Dan Shafer, 480 pages, ISBN 0957921829

According to Amazon.com this book will teach you how to…

– Appreciate why maintaining tables is a nightmare and how CSS can help
– Understand when to use CSS and when not to use CSS
– Design using CSS Positioning and multi-column page layouts
– Use the different types of CSS rules
– Reap the benefits of inheritance in CSS
– Style text and other content using CSS
– Make the most of other non-obvious uses of CSS
– Use CSS to achieve maximum Web Accessibility
– Design sites that are standards compliant
– Accommodate older Browsers

And much more...

Plus, it also comes with a practical three-column sample Website that utilizes CSS and a FREE download of the site and all of its code.

My comment: Reading the user-reviews at Amazon.com I see that people who have read the book either love it or hate it. It is either 5 stars or 1. Hardly anything in between. I tend to lean to around 2 myself.... Not all that good. There are better books for learning these techniques.

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Cascading Style Sheets 2.0 – Programmer's Reference by Eric A. Meyer, 334 pages, ISBN 0072131780

Product Description from Amazon.com: The most authoritative quick reference available for CSS programmers. This handy resource gives you programming essentials at your fingertips, including all the new tags and features in CSS 2.0. You'll get concise information on designing and deploying complex style sheets as well as details on browser support.

My comment: This book is definitely not for the beginner. Even if you can look up the different tags and their descriptions, it is not easy reading or easy to absorb or translate for use in real life. I've read parts of it, but it really isn't a book for me either. If you need easy to absorb hand-holding and easy to understand descriptions, this is not it. This is a book for the real nerd that already has a lot of CSS knowledge and only needs a reference.

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Adobe GoLive CS Tips & Tricks by Lynn Grillo and Adam Pratt. 352 pages, ISBN 0321278771.

Both new and old users of GoLive can learn something

It might be easy to dismiss this book as simply a tips and tricks book without any real depth if you just have a quick look at it, but it is much more than that.

This book explains in images and short and clear texts how to do something, points at easy to miss buttons and explains what to do with them, and fills in your knowledgegaps about GoLive. It also adds understanding to what GoLive can do and how to do it.

The texts might look short, but together with the images they are quite enough to give you that aha-experience of understanding.

I've used GoLive since it was GoLive Cyber Studio 2, long before Adobe bought it, and today use GoLive CS. I've used GoLive daily for years.

I've really enjoyed this book and learned a lot of new things that I didn't know before or have missed somehow over the years just because I've used GoLive for such a long time.

I warmly recommend it to both new and old users. It has something for both the novice and the more experienced user. Buy it! Read it! GoLive will be all that more fun to work with after having gone through this book.

(Review from Amazon.com)

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InDesign CS2 for Macintosh and Windows : Visual QuickStart Guide (Visual Quickstart Guides) (Paperback), 600 pages, Peachpit Press (September 26, 2005), ISBN 0321322010

Book description from Amazon.com: You already know why it makes sense for you to learn Adobe InDesign: because major magazines, newspapers, book publishers, ad agencies, graphic-design firms, and corporate creative groups worldwide use it to increase productivity and refine creative results. And you need to get up to speed on the very newest version--Adobe InDesign CS2--today! Enter Adobe InDesign CS2 for Macintosh and Windows: Visual QuickStart Guide. Using the task-based, visual approach that has become the hallmark of Peachpit's popular Visual QuickStart Guides, this volume provides a fast, easy, comprehensive introduction to everything InDesign. You'll learn about all aspects of the InDesign interface, including its tools and palettes, as well as how to create documents and master pages, import and style text and objects, automate your work, manage long documents, use the Bezier pen tools,create interactive PDF elements, and work with color. You'll also learn how to use the new Adobe Bridge file browser to locate, manage, and drag and drop assets easily into your InDesign layouts. You’ll find a new chapter on working with InCopy, complete coverage of more advanced topics (like preflighting and advanced text control) and a thorough introduction to all of InDesign's productivity-enhancing features and tools.

My comment: I keep recommending this book with every new version because it is a very good source to look things up in when you are looking for something.

Adobe InDesign CS/CS2 Breakthroughs (Paperback)
by David Blatner, Anne-Marie Concepcion. 264 pages, Peachpit Press (June 3, 2005), ISBN 0321334132

From the book description at Amazon.com: Adobe InDesign is taking the publishing world by storm and users are hungry for breakthrough solutions to their myriad concerns—from how best to manage the program's sometimes unwieldy interface to how to produce quality PDF files. Page-layout guru David Blatner and veteran trainer Anne-Marie "HerGeekness" Concepción have scoured the online forums, interviewed Adobe engineers, and gathered together answers to over 200 of the most-commonly asked questions. Written in a sassy, fun-to-read style, this book tackles every major InDesign problem with a lay-it-on-the-line solution. Adobe InDesign CS/CS2 Breakthroughs is for anyone who has been using InDesign long enough to realize that the solution to their problems isn't always as obvious as one would expect.

My comment: I entirely trust the knowledge of David and Anne-Marie from what I've seen over the years on the forums and mailinglists where we all meet. Various users also warmly recommend this book and even though I haven't seen or read it, I think it is safe to say that you won't regret getting it.

InDesign CS for Macintosh and Windows : Visual QuickStart Guide (Visual Quickstart Guides) by Sandee Cohen [ISBN 0321213483], 576 pages.

Quickly find what you look for

Don't want to read long texts about how to do something? Rather want to look at pictures? Then this book is for you. It is a visual reference book, full with screenshots of the relevant dialogs and menus, in an easy to find things in and well organized book. If you quickly want to find that particular thing you suddenly do not remember how to do, find it here.

I warmly recommend this book. It is a very good reference in combination with the Real World InDesign CS book below. You first look in this one. Then, if you want to dig deeper, you read on in Real World InDesign CS.

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RealWorld Adobe InDesign CS by Olav Martin Kvern and David Blatner. 808 pages, ISBN 032121921X.

In depth knowledge you get nowhere else

If you want to really get to learn InDesign from the bottom up also with its more advanced functions, this is the book you should get. Granted, it is not for beginners in the first hand, but for those of us who work with the application all the time and need to dig deeper to understand what it can do, be it nested styles, tables, master pages or whatever.

The authors have deep knowledge and insight of the application and there are no others that could share their knowledge better. It might not teach you how to do design, but it teaches you how to use and understand the application. And it give you a level of depth that no other book about InDesign does.

I have had the Real World InDesign book as a reference for when I want to have things explained so I understand them since the very first version of this book, when Ole was the only author of it. With the addition of David Blatner as a coauthor also came the understanding of what QuarkXPress users might want and need to know to get started with InDesign, now that more and more of them are converting to InDesign.

That Ole works for Adobe does not mean that he is a non-critical advocate for the application. He runs his own race here and not Adobes.

The Real World InDesign CS book is the best reference book you can buy if you want real deep knowledge of the application, and not only one more manual (which the Classroom in a Book is in my opinion).

(Review from Amazon.com)

I use this book in courses about Adobe InDesign.

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Moving to InDesign : Use What You Know About QuarkXPress and PageMaker to Get Up to Speed in InDesign Fast! by David Blatner, Christopher Smith, Steve Werner, 288 pages, ISBN 0321294114.

More info about the book at http://www.peachpit.com/title/0321294114

For those who are switching from QuarkXpress or PageMaker to Adobe InDesign CS

Many or those who switch to Adobe InDesign from QuarkXpress or PageMaker these days. Those who do might not need a book about everything that InDesign is and is able to do. What they need is a book about the differences in techniques between the applications. Then this book is a good choice. It compares how things were done in QuarkXpress or PageMaker to how it is done in InDesign. If you also want to dig a bit deeper into InDesign you buy both this book and Real World InDesign CS. If you only want to get started and get over the obstacles with changing to new application that in principle does what you have done for years in that other application, but in another way than what you are used to, you chose this book.

I warmly recommend this book, and I use it in courses for switchers to InDesign.

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Adobe Photoshop CS2 Studio Techniques (Paperback)
by Ben Willmore, 592 pages. Adobe Press; Bk&CD-Rom edition (August 17, 2005), ISBN 0321321898

Also see my comments below about the previous version of this book.

Book description from Amazon.com: If you're ready to go from blindly following step-by-step instructions to "Aha, I finally GET Photoshop!" this is the place to start. In these pages, world renowned Photoshop instructor and best-selling author Ben Willmore writes in his signature style–intuitive, crystal clear, and in-depth–helping you gain the deep understanding needed to master Photoshop's most essential features. Complex concepts like Curves and Channels are broken down into easy to digest metaphors and descriptions, and features new to Photoshop CS2–such as Bridge, Smart Objects, the revamped Layers Palette and Camera Raw dialog box, as well as the awesome new Warping and Vanishing Point features–are all covered in the depth they deserve, making it possible to quickly adapt them into your daily workflow. Whether you’re a photographer, designer, production artist or hobbyist, the knowledge you gain in this book can dramatically change the way you think about Photoshop.

My comment: I like the way Ben Willmore succeeds in explaining how things work in Photoshop. He explains it so you really understand not only how to do something, but also why.

Real World Adobe Photoshop CS2 (Paperback)
by Bruce Fraser, David Blatner, 984 pages, Peachpit Press (October 21, 2005), ISBN 0321334116

The reviewers at Amazon say this is a good book

Book description from Amazon.com: Fooling around with Photoshop to create interesting composite artwork is all well and good. But if you rely on Photoshop to meet tough production challenges in a fast-paced professional environment, fooling around won't cut it! You need results, and you need them now: This book delivers! In this copiously illustrated volume, best-selling authors David Blatner and Bruce Fraser offer scads of hands-on production techniques as well as clear explanations of the concepts that drive them, so that you can get the best results possible on your own Photoshop CS2 projects. You'll learn about managing color, getting great scans, correcting tones and colors, and more. You also find complete coverage of all of Photoshop CS2's newest features: integration with Adobe Bridge; Vanishing Point; super-tight integration with the rest of Adobe's Creative Suite 2; and more. Throughout, the emphasis is on efficiency: the time-saving tips and professional shortcuts that will allow you to work faster, smarter, and more creatively with Photoshop CS2.

My comment: I haven't neither read or seen this book. I trust the two authors though. As Amazon.com describes them: David Blatner is an internationally known expert on Photoshop and QuarkXPress and is the author of numerous other books, including Real World QuarkXPress and Real World Adobe InDesign. David lectures on desktop publishing and multimedia at conferences and workshops around the world. Co-author, Bruce Fraser, is an internationally known authority on digital imaging and color reproduction. In addition to speaking and consulting on these topics, he is the author of Real World Camera Raw with Adobe Photoshop; the co-author of Real World Color Management, the definitive guide to color management systems; and a contributing editor for Macworld magazine and creativepro.com.

Adobe Photoshop CS Studio Techniques by Ben Willmore 720 pages, ISBN 0321213521

It is a VERY GOOD book

I wrote the below review about the Photoshop 7 version of this book. The same review is valid also for the CS version of the book, even though he no longer includes anything about ImageReady, Photoshop twin application for web graphics.

It is a VERY GOOD book, lots of illustrations, all in color so you can actually see the result of things, very good descriptions of how to do things. Deep enough for me to understand them and being able to actually explain the procedures to other people. I actually used his chapter about bettering greyscale images in a special course I did for two women who does a paper only in greyscale (they use InDesign and Photoshop). So that chapter I dug into real deep at the time. The other parts of the book are just as good. I really like this book. It also comes with a CD with all image-examples used in the book.

I warmly recommend it to anyone who wants to dig deeper into Photoshop and really understand how to use the tools and techniques in it. It doesn't just teach how to make spectacular effects, it actually gives understand to all the techniques and teaches you how to use them yourself.

(Review from Amazon.com)

I used to use this book as a reference book at courses about Photoshop.

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Real World Adobe Photoshop CS by David Blatner, Bruce Fraser 928 pages, ISBN: 0321245784

The reviewers at Amazon say this is a good book

I haven't neither read or seen this book. I trust the two authors though for being good tutors and knowing what they write about and therefore recommend this book unseen – which is not what I usually want to do. There is a definitive limit though to how many reference books you can afford to buy... I settled for Ben Willmores book above, but if you want an alternative, this is a good one as far as I can judge.

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Adobe Illustrator CS2 @work : Projects You Can Use on the Job (Paperback) by Pariah S. Burke , 336 pages, Sams (October 10, 2005), ISBN 0672328011

The reviewers at Amazon praise this book

From the book description at Amazon.com: There are plenty of books available to teach you how to use the different tools that are a part of Adobe Illustrator CS2. But how many will actually show you how to work with the tools and techniques and apply them to real-world, relevant projects that you encounter every day at work? This one will. Adobe Illustrator CS2 @ Work: Projects You Can Use on the Job is a project-based guide that will help you complete workplace projects while you learn how to use Illustrator CS2. Detailed, well-explained instructions will help you accomplish job-related tasks, including:
• Designing and working with logos.
• Designing corporate identity materials.
• Illustrating a poster.
• Designing product packaging.
• Designing a trifold brochure.
• Designing a magazine advertisement.
• Designing a DVD package, label and menu.
• Designing a website.

Tips, tricks and notes will provide you with the information that you need to apply what you learn through these projects to projects you encounter every day at work. Learn by doing rather than reading with Adobe Illustrator CS2 @ Work: Projects You Can Use on the Job.

My comment: Why do I recommend this book? I seems to be a good learning-by-doing book and reviewers at Amazon.com praise it. I've also seen some other of Pariahs writings and enjoy it. I've frequently also visited his website, which I enjoy a lot. He alos runs the Quark vs. InDesign website which is definitely worth a visit. Among other things.

The Adobe Illustrator CS2 Wow! Book (Paperback)
by Sharon Steuer, 464 pages, Peachpit Press; Bk&CD-Rom edition (August 23, 2005), ISBN 0321320468

The reviewers at Amazon praise this book

Book description from Amazon.com: Designed to dazzle and inspire but not leave you in the dust, this beautifully designed volume lets you follow along as it dissects real-world projects from some of today’s top Illustrator artists. In the process it teaches you how to use Adobe Illustrator CS2 in ever more creative ways for your own projects. Best-selling author and award-winning artist Sharon Steuer uses lavish, four-color images of real-world Illustrator CS2 projects to show what’s possible and then employs simple, step-by-step instructions to explain the techniques that will produce those effects. You’ll find comprehensive coverage of all of Illustrator CS2’s most important capabilities. Veteran users will be grateful to explore Illustrator CS' new features, including the new drawing tool, Live trace, Live paint, SVG-T and much more. On the CD, you'll find many examples of artwork from the book, third-party software, demos, samples, and more.

My comment: My knowledge of this book happens to be intimate as I helped beta-testing it (which means testing the examples and methods described in the book) during its creation this version around. I learned a lot on the way and realised that there is much more to knowing Illustrator and a lot of fun techniques to grasp and make use of. Not for the beginner, but if you want to learn more and get more deeply into it, this is the book for you.

NOTE. There are other books about Adobe Illustrator CS at Amazon.com. Some of them I would not even consider mentioning and of course not buy. The above seem to be good but of course I cannot promise that they suit you.

Mac OS X Help Line, Panther Edition by Ted Landau 1184 pages, ISBN 0321193873.

For the technical inclined and the real nerds

This is not a book for the regular user. Your need to be more technically interested and real hooked on problem solving.

My ex-collgues at my former job use this book in courses on Mac OS X for system administrators. We have also used all the previous versions back to earlier versions of Mac OS and always found them good for the more advanced user who wants to dig real deep into the operating system, trouble-shooting, problem-solving and the like.

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Page last updated 2006-01-01