On a whim I bought this on Amazon's Prime Day sale: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1118008189 It arrived this afternoon but despite the overwhelmingly positive reviews and best seller status it's actually really disappointing. It claims to be suitable for professionals but in reality it's extremely thin on information, being heavily padded with needless photographs, and what it does contain seems to be basic to the extreme. I'm familiar with basic HTML but not CSS. I didn't mind getting a book covering both as it'd be good to read through as a refresher (I last read a book on HTML about 17 years ago) and there'll be a lot I don't know. I have made sites using Dreamweaver but I really wanted to just start from the ground up in a text editor and learn to do everything myself. Ultimately this book doesn't seem like it can teach me very much so I'm going to return it. On top of that it's printed on pretty thin paper that doesn't seem like it'll last long. It looks and feels more like a magazine tutorial than a text book. So anyway, now that I've had a little moan (sorry), I'll get to the point Can anyone recommend a book, or books, on HTML (including 5) and CSS that covers the basics but moves on to more advanced stuff and doesn't patronise the reader? I do know I could use free websites to learn from but I like books. Ideally I'd like something comprehensive enough to be used as a reference book too. Thanks, Paul Edit: I think on reflection I judged the book too harshly. It is more magazine tutorial than text book in terms of its presentation, and I think ultimately that's my problem with it, but it's not as lacking in content as I first thought. I've looked through it a bit more and I think it's more a case of the presentation being overly simplistic (for my tastes - too much white space, too many images, too little text) than the actual content being wholly basic. I think it just wasn't what I was expecting so I had a knee-jerk reaction and decided it sucked. I'm still not sure I want to keep it but I thought I should update this to acknowledge that my disappointment is probably more subjective than objective; many people probably like this book for the very reasons I don't. I'd still appreciate recommendations for a decent reference book, or books
HTML5 & CSS3 For The Real World looked like it wouldn't be bad but bizarrely one reviewer says it lacks an index.
Thanks, I probably will use some online resources too so I'll sign up to that, I just like having a decent text book to learn from and refer to (call me old fashioned). I can lie in bed with a book and comfortably read a few chapters before I go to sleep, it's nice not to always be tethered to a PC and staring at a screen.
I'm just working through the Codecademy stuff now, so far it's all familiar but it's nice to have a refresher. It reminds me of introductory programming at uni with C#, lots of repetition of simple things. How have you found the book? Would you say my first impressions of it are unfair or do you find it overly simple too? I'm certainly in a minority if the Amazon reviews are anything to go by. Or have you not got yours yet?
Just wanted to say I'm really enjoying Codecademy. I'd still like a decent reference text book but this is good fun and very simple to use. I already gave you rep but thanks again
I would also say you could see some nice things at : https://www.livecoding.tv/livestreams/ Aka see others code
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgGbWId6zgaWZkPFI4Sc9QXDmmOWa1v5F One of the best teachers in web development. Best text editor is Sublime Text.
