Doing Web Development: Client Side Techniques

Rating:
Summary: Finally! Something for the Client-Side
Review: I finally decided to take the plunge and start doing some Internet development. Considering the number of books available there seem to be very few that covered developing a complete client-side application. Books seem to cover one aspect of Web development such as: HTML, XML, Javascript, etc. The vast majority seem to cover ASP, ASP.NET, and JSP. That wasn't what I was looking for.

Doing Web Development starts at the very begining, with an introduction to the Internet, discusses designing for the web (can be applied to any software design), writing HTML, and continues with many, if not most, of the current tools used in Web development today.

The exercises ("Try It") build on each other and allow you to use what you've already done in the next lesson. If you didn't do so well on a "try It" or you want to skip around in the text, the source code can be downloaded from the Apress website. You do not need any special development environment, such as Frontpage, since it is suggested that you learn the syntax by typing for yourself as a form of re-enforced learning. Any text editor will do. With that said you may want another, more detailed, source for any topic you want to cover in depth. Reference material is also handy for various topics. Ms. Kurata presents many of the key elements for each topic but more information is needed if you want to take full advantage of a feature.

Don't take what I've said about the things that Doing Web Development doesn't contain as this book being a waste of time. On the contrary. It's an excellent book if you're interested in being exposed to the current trends in client-side Web development. The book provides enough information for you to develop Web pages using any of the tools presented. Just don't expect the book to make you a guru on any one subject. That's OK by me. I doubt I would put in the work to reach guru status anyway.

By the way, Ms. Kurata provides some excellent sources of addition information at the end of each chapter. I found that to be very helpful.

Rating:
Summary: FOR NEWBIES ONLY
Review: This books covers the client-side topics every developer should know, but hardly goes into enough detail on any one topic to be useful.

I really wish the topics were covered in more depth. New developers might find this to be a good introduction to the topics. However, you won't be able to do much unless you have access to more detailed information from other sources.