Recommended Web Books

JavaScript For The World Wide Web

Written by: Negrino & Smith

Publisher: Peachpit Press

Published: 2004 (5th Edition)

Pages: 494

Price: £16.99

Comments: The best JavaScript book on the market. Very useful examples supported by comments that explain what the code does. Includes chapters on frames, windows, forms, regular expressions, event handling, cookies and node manipulation. If you only want to buy one book to teach yourself JavaScript, this is the one.

DHTML And CSS For The World Wide Web

Written by: Cranford Teague

Publisher: Peachpit Press

Published: 2004 (3rd Edition)

Pages: 519

Price: £16.99

Comments: Another very fine book from Peachpit Press with good examples and supporting explanations. This is an excellent book for learning the basics of DHTML and CSS. CSS chapters cover font, text and element controls, element positioning and visibility. The DHTML chapters contain information on the Document Object Model, events and dynamic techniques. The book then brings DHTML and CSS together and covers layout, navigation and controls.

DHTML And CSS Advanced

Written by: Cranford Teague

Publisher: Peachpit Press

Published: 2005

Pages: 424

Price: £21.99

Comments: This book expands on the topics covered in DHTML And CSS For The World Wide Web and briefly touches on accessibility (pretty rare in a book on coding) as well as using XML for databases. The chapter on navigation is excellent with examples of so many types of menus that it makes the mind boggle. This book is a little expensive and is not for beginners.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) By Example

Written by: Callihan

Publisher: Que

Published: 2002

Pages: 461

Price: £21.99

Comments: The perfect book for beginners on CSS, this book introduced me to style sheets and I haven't come across a better one yet. It teaches CSS in a clear logical way that continually builds on what you've previously covered.

VBScript In A Nutshell

Written by: Childs, Lomax & Petrusha

Publisher: O'Reilly

Published: 2000

Pages: 495

Price: £24.95

Comments: The only book for VBScript. This is not an easy read and over half of the book is a detailed reference section covering the statements, procedures and functions of the language as well as the objects, properties and methods. All the information you'll ever need on VBScript is in this book.

HTML & XHTML - The Definitive Guide

Written by: Musciano & Kennedy

Publisher: O'Reilly

Published: 2002 (5th Edition)

Pages: 645

Price: £28.50

Comments: The definitive guide? Yes, it probably is but it comes at a price. Beginners should look for something a little less weighty but this book covers about every aspect of HTML and XHTML. It also includes chapters on CSS (as you would expect in a serious book about XHTML), executable content, dynamic documents and XML.

JavaScript For Web Professionals

Written by: Barrett

Publisher: Prentice Hall

Published: 2003 (2nd Edition)

Pages: 319

Price: £23.99

Comments: A useful book when browsing for ideas but it is in no way as comprehensive as JavaScript For The World Wide Web. This is not recommended as an easy read for beginners and is quite expensive but it does contain some nice code especially in the Advanced JavaScript chapter.

Fun Web Pages With JavaScript

Written by: Shelley

Publisher: Bernard Babani

Published: 2002 (2nd Edition)

Pages: 349

Price: £7.99

Comments: For the JavaScript novice this book is pretty good at showing you what JavaScript is capable of and is well worth the price. For more experienced programmers this is a handy sized reference but is far from comprehensive. The book covers Form Validation, Rollovers, Animating Images and Cookies.

Designing Web Graphics

Written by: Weinman

Publisher: New Riders

Published: 2003 (4th Edition)

Pages: 512

Price: £42.99

Comments: An impressive looking and expensive book. However the title is somewhat misleading as less than half the book is concerned with graphics which is disappointing as they are the best parts in the book. Chapters include Web Aesthetics, Project Planning and Accessibility and there is some very basic html/xhtml code included which seems a bit pointless as this is hardly a beginner's book. It is quite a pleasant read but most of the content is covered far better in Web Style Guide at less than a third of the price.

Son Of Web Pages That Suck

Written by: Flanders

Publisher: Sybex

Published: 2002

Pages: 295

Price: £32.99

Comments: This is the sequel to the best-selling Web Pages That Suck and is insanely brilliant. It teaches good design for the web by exposing bad design and Vincent Flanders shows little mercy in his scathing and highly funny commentary. An essential read for anyone designing commercial websites. The book also comes with a CD that contains some very useful software including the excellent CSE HTML Validator Lite.

Cascading Style Sheets - The Definitive Guide

Written by: Meyer

Publisher: O'Reilly

Published: 2000

Pages: 453

Price: £28.50

Comments: Another excellent book from the publishers O'Reilly. This will teach the reader all they need to know about CSS and contains a handy reference section. It is nearly as good as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) By Example but is not quite as well structured.

Dynamic HTML - The Definitive Reference

Written by: Goodman

Publisher: O'Reilly

Published: 2002 (2nd Edition)

Pages: 1,401

Price: £42.50

Comments: A massive book that will cut the circulation off to your legs if you read it resting on your lap. This is, as it says in the title, a reference book. It is not for beginners or those without a desk to rest it on and anyone hoping to learn DHTML from this book will find it very hard going. It is, however, an essential resource for DHTML freaks.

JavaScript - The Definitive Guide

Written by: Flanagan

Publisher: O'Reilly

Published: 2002 (4th Edition)

Pages: 915

Price: £31.95

Comments: This provides a thorough description of the core JavaScript language. It covers the usual tasks, such as Cookies, Data Validation and Animations as well as containing detailed reference sections. More of a reference than a guide, this is a very useful book for the experienced programmer but is not the best book for the beginner.

Web Style Guide

Written by: Lynch & Horton

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2001 (2nd Edition)

Pages: 223

Price: £12.50

Comments: The essential guide for website designers, this offers invaluable help on a massive range of issues, including Interface Design, Site & Page Design, Typography and Graphics. For a book that is covering such important issues it is highly readable and a must for serious web designers.

Web Publishing With HTML And XHTML

Written by: Lemay

Publisher: Sams Publishing

Published: 2001

Pages: 834

Price: £25.50

Comments: A good "teach yourself" book that covers HTML, XHTML and also introduces CSS. It is easy to follow and uses XHTML code throughout. An excellent guide for the beginner and a useful reference for the more experienced.

HTML - Programmer's Reference

Written by: Powell & Whitworth

Publisher: Osborne

Published: 2001 (2nd Edition)

Pages: 436

Price: £14.99

Comments: For a small book this contains a great deal of information. It is an excellent reference for HTML/XHTML but unfortunately it does not cover Cascading Style Sheets.

Ajax In Action

Written by: Dave Crane, Eric Pascarello & Darren James

Publisher: Manning

Published: 2006

Pages: 650

Price: £31.99

Comments: A book explaining the ins and outs of Asynchronous JavaScript and XML. This is very detailed and includes topics such as usability, security and live searching using XML. You need a very good understanding of JavaScript to follow the examples.