Bruce Von Stiers

Over the last few years I had written reviews of various computer self help books. These books ranged from very basic software usage to very complex programming instructions. One of the types of books that is still in great demand deals with creating web pages. A book that was just published by Que Corp. is another title in that area. The title of the book is Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Creating Web Pages. The author of the book is Todd Stauffer.

The book has five parts with 22 chapters and an Appendix. There are 538 pages in the book and it was copyrighted in 2002.

The five parts of the book are Creating Web Pages, Design and Conquer, Building Your Site, Interacting with Your Users and Web Publishing Tools. There is also an Introduction that tells you what to expect out of the book and how it is organized.

Chapter 1 is titled Fundamentals of Web Publishing. You will learn here the history of the Internet and the different basic elements of how the Web works. You find out that writing HTML code is not actually programming. The second chapter gives you a quick lesson on web design. The author covers basic web design theory and how to plan a web site. The third chapter deals with the tools that you will need to get started designing your web pages. Learn what type of editors will work best for you. You will learn what a web server is and how it can be of help. And the fourth chapter takes you through creating your first web pages.

In Part 2, Design and Conquer there are several chapters that get down to the nitty gritty of web page design. Chapter 5 is Formatting Your Text. Here you will learn how to organize a web page so that it is easily read by people surfing by your web site. Learn how to use paragraph elements to enhance a web page. Chapter 6 deals with adding graphics to a web page. It even gives an example of a graphics program that is used to edit an image for use in a web page. Chapter 7 is all about hyperlinks. Learn how to create links and set up special ones.

Chapter 8 takes you into the basics of making tables for a web page. Learn about table attributes and how they can affect the overall look of a table. The next chapter covers some advanced table techniques. Chapter 10 shows you how to jazz things up with fancy fonts and special characters. And Chapter 11 gets into some more advanced techniques for building a web page.

Chapters 12 through 14 are about building your web site. Chapter 12 has you creating web pages with frames. Chapter 13 goes through some of the multimedia elements that can be used and why they should be. And Chapter 14 is alls about something called the Site-Wide Style Sheet.

Part 4 is Interacting with Your Users. Here you will find chapters on using HTLM forms and data gathering elements on web pages. You get an introduction to JavaScript and how it can be utilized for user input and output. And you will learn a little something about and advanced technique called Dynamic HTML.

The last three chapters in the book deal with the various web design tools that are available for use. The author shows which one does what and the strengths and weaknesses of each. Learn about Forums and other add-ons for a web site. And the last chapter goes through finding the right web hosting service.

Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Creating Web Pages is a good book for learning the basics of web design. It has a ton of HTML coding examples and real good illustrations. It might be a little too wordy for some folks, but overall it was easy to understand. It would have been nice to have a CD come along with the book that had examples from it but you can’t have everything.

Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Creating Web Pages is at book resellers like WaldenBooks and Barnes and Nobles. You can also order from Que Corp at www.quepublishing.com.