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6 CSS Web Design For Dummies

CSS is loaded with features to improve productivity for Web page design and

maintenance, ifthe designer knows how to exploit them. CSS Web Design For

Dummies is the handbook that takes the reader from idea to finished site.

I hope that all my work exploring CSS benefits you, showing you many useful

shortcuts and guiding you over the rough spots. I won’t pull any punches: I

confess when I had to wrestle with CSS or other code for several hours to

accomplish something. But after I’ve put in the time getting it work, I can

almost always show youhow to do it in a few minutes. The example code is

here in this book, ready to do what you need done.

Plain, Clear English .........................................................................................

Also, unlike some other books about CSS (which must remain nameless —

they know who they are!), this book is written in plain, clear English. Novices

find many sophisticated tasks made easy: The book is filled with step-by-step

examples that beginners can follow, even if they’ve never written a line of CSS

or HTML, or designed a single Web page. And if you’re an experienced CSS

designer, better still. You’ll find out how to accomplish sophisticated tasks

quickly. You also discover how to harness the machinery built into CSS. You

also find out how to leverage your current skills to prepare for the future of

CSS programming: moving beyond CSS2 to CSS3.

How to Use This Book ....................................................................................

This book concentrates on the currently accepted version of Cascading Style

Sheets: CSS2. The next version, CSS3, is not scheduled to become official

(translation: fully adopted by Internet Explorer) for several years. However,

the CSS committees continue to meet, exchange e-mail, and accept sugges-

tions from the likes of us. They also plan to roll out “modules” — parts of the

CSS3 recommendation will appear occasionally for the next few years. If you

want to experiment with some of the new stuff, download Mozilla Firefox and

try some of the CSS3 code examples in Chapter 15. They won’t work in

Internet Explorer, as yet.

This book obviously can’t cover every feature in HTML, scripting, and still do

a good job with CSS itself. Yet these technologies intimately interact in the

better, more dynamic, and engaging Web sites. CSS adds beauty and coherence

to a site. HTML contains the content and organizes it into a tree structure.

Scripting offers sophisticated interaction with the user, dramatic animated

effects, and other benefits.

As you try the many step-by-step examples in this book, you’ll become familiar

with the most useful features of CSS and find many shortcuts and time-saving

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