HTML & CSS QuickStart Guide Review

picture of the cover

By Christopher Williams

HTML and CSS are some of the first topics that are explored by any new enterprising programmer and HTML & CSS QuickStart Guide does a great job of helping guide that exploration!

HTML & CSS QuickStart Guide is separated into four different parts. The first part is what are the purposes of HTML and CSS and how a website works. The second part takes the biggest part of the book and it does with the basics of CSS and HTML. The third part is about more advanced topics like bootstrap, HTML forms and embedding audio along with other bits. Finally the last part is pretty short which is about creating an effective work environment like having a workflow and Git.

Throughout the book there are small code snippets and graphics to help show the material and also some exercises and a large project where you help create a coffee shop website to help practice your new skills. The book also has a Github link to the code that is used in the book, has a very simple template file to use for a basic HTML website and a pdf to a list of useful links as well.

picture of some code snippets

First, let's go over some issues because as always every book is not perfect. The only real issue I have is that the overall website project is not used that often and really should have been included more often since it is better than the small exercises.

One issue I can see people having is the lack of javascript but I do not think that is a major issue. It's good for a book to specialize in one area and this book is geared towards total novices so it's good to just point to HTML and CSS and stick to that.

picture of more code snippets

Now onto the benefits that make this book standout. This is a really good book for novices, it starts gently, explains everything and you end with a nice set of tools. What also is great about this book is that it goes past just HTML and CSS but has a section on Git which is vital for any project and how to incorporate it into your workspace. It goes into a little about website hosting to help anyone start up. It also has great examples to showcase all of this knowledge and excellent practice examples to actually learn those skills as well.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone that wants a general book to learn how to build your own website, especially if you are completely new to programming. If you are seasoned in programming, it's still a great book for you too because it has a bit of everything. The only people I would not recommend this book to are people who already know HTML and CSS to a decent degree and want to expand their skill set, this book is really about the basics and that is it.

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