Review of Eric Meyer on CSS

I am on record as saying that Case Western Reserve University has one of the best university Web sites. This book reveals that Eric Meyer was formerly the Webmaster for that site. Currently he is employed by Netscape Communications as a Standards Evangelist, based in Cleveland, Ohio. He is also an Invited Expert with the W3C's CSS&FP Working Group.

This book is his third on the subject of CSS (Cascading Style Sheets).1 Its goal is to teach the practical aspects of adding CSS to existing Web pages (removing as much as possible of the HTML used purely for page layout2), and it is organized into 13 projects. The projects may be downloaded from a companion Web page which also provides errata, links, and other information. Each project stands alone; but they also increase in complexity from first to last, so there is benefit in working through them in succession.

Each project begins with statements of goals and preparations, then proceeds step by step until the goals are accomplished. At each step, the CSS statements to be added are shown in contrasting color. There are plenty of screenshots to show how things should look, and the margins provide frequent cross-references and tips. The projects are far from elementary, and almost everything you learn from them can be applied immediately to creating production Web sites. All in all, Meyer's thoroughly knowledgeable treatment of the subject, his clear writing, and the advanced typography provided by the publisher make this a very worthwhile book for those wishing to learn CSS in hands-on fashion.

Indeed, my main complaint is that the book is entirely practical. I wished for some discussion of the W3C specification and underlying theory. Of course (as Meyer points out in his Introduction), his other two books on CSS cover these aspects of the subject.

The book does not ignore the underlying technology. See for example the table comparing the performance of an HTML-only page with the same markup styled with CSS (Table 1.1, page 30) and the hints on retaining the HTML Table attribute CellSpacing (main text, page 5; sidebar tip, page 59).3 Meyer mentions browser limitations throughout the book. However, I feel that a more unified and complete coverage of this problem, which is the bane of every Web designer's existence4, would have been very useful here.

Beyond that, I have only quibbles. Some of the techniques Meyer presents are those on which Web-design purists will look askance. For example, he commonly uses the Verdana font, which many feel is hard to read because its characters are larger that the "standard" ones in Arial or Times New Roman. The W3C CSS2 specification says that "Color" and "Background" should be used together to avoid causing problems for UAs (user agents)5; but Meyer frequently uses them separately. Also, he often leaves HTML formatting tags like "<B>" or "<U>" in his code. Purists regard this as anathema. But, as I say, these are mere quibbles and should not discourage anyone from buying this excellent book. When I have the money, I'll be adding it to my library.6

1 The others are Cascading Style Sheets: The Definitive Guide (O'Reilly, 2000) and Cascading Style Sheets 2.0 Programmer's Reference (Osborne/McGraw-Hill, 2001).

2 The central idea is that HTML should be used for document structure — a table of numerical data, say — and the layout or formatting should be done with CSS.

3 In this connection, the book has a very well-done index, with two levels of subtopics. I found myself using it to locate tips such as the ones on CellSpacing.

4 It bites Meyer in Project 7, where the yellow highlighting he uses for the input field that has the focus does not work in MSIE6 SP1 (but does in Firebird 0.7).

5 Commonly known as Web browsers.

6 I used a public library copy for this review.

ERIC MEYER ON CSS: Mastering the Language of Web Design Eric Meyer Indianapolis: New Riders, 2003				Rating: 5.0 High
ISBN 0-7357-1245-X	322pp.	SC/FCI	$45.00

ERIC MEYER ON CSS

Reviewed 12/21/2003