Looking for your advice on books

This isn't a review. I'm looking for your reviews.

I am teaching myself Web design. I have gone through a book on HTML, am in the middle of a JavaScript book and am looking for a good CSS book. What I want is a book that is not just a reference guide, but one that has you type in examples and teaches you the language as well. I am open to suggestions for CSS and JavaScript.

Also, any suggestions as far as other skills to learn such as Perl, ASP, Flash, Java, Dreamweaver, VBScript.

Thanks alot for your suggestions.

 

[TonyGroves]

The best education is of course practice - find a real project that you reckon you will be able to complete with a bit of study. That will make it obvious which skills you need to perfect, and will present problems which will make it easier to decide which texts are most suitable.

There's no point reading books about, for example, both JavaScript and VBScript, as they are mutually exclusive technologies. Or both Perl and ASP (and PHP) for the same reason. And forget about Flash for the moment; it's an advanced artist's tool and you don't need it. Also forget about web-authoring IDEs like Dreamweaver/NVu for the moment; they hide what's really going on and teach you very little.

So, the most useful skills are most likely to be, in descending order of importance, HTML, JavaScript, CSS, PHP.

O'Reilly's books tend to be the best. "CSS The Definitive Guide" and "JavaScript The Definitive Guide" are both very good. There is probably also a similar book on PHP.

 

[Stretchwickster]

I would definitely recommend any of SitePoint's web design/development books - they are excellent resources:

http://www.sitepoint.com/books/

Peachpit's books are also pretty good:

http://www.peachpit.com/store/index.aspx?st=60962

In terms of additional skills to acquire, I would definitely recommend learning a server-side language. PHP is a good one that I've used and which you'll find available in most web hosting packages.

Clive

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[traingamer]

The Peachpit books mentioned above are very good tools for hands-on learning. I can recommend 4 or 5 of them first hand. I haven't yet seen CSS Web Site Design Hands on Training By Eric Meyer, but his previous books from Peachpit are all excellent.

Many free tutorials can be found on the web as well.

Greg
"Personally, I am always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught." - Winston Churchill