FreeLists / webproducers / [webproducers] Re: creating accessible websites and how it impacts the project life cycle

["tonyzeoli" <tonyzeoli@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Standards, argues Jeffrey Zeldman in Designing With Web Standards, are our 
only hope for breaking out of the endless cycle of testing that plagues 
designers hoping to support all possible clients. In this book, he explains 
how designers can best use standards--primarily XHTML and CSS, plus 
ECMAScript and the standard Document Object Model (DOM)--to increase their 
personal productivity and maximize the availability of their creations. 
Zeldman's approach is detailed, authoritative, and rich with historical 
context, as he is quick to explain how features of standards evolved. It's a 
fantastic education that any design professional will appreciate.
Zeldman is an idealist who devotes some of his book to explaining how much 
easier life would be if browser developers would just support standards 
properly (he's done a lot toward this goal in real life, as well). He is 
also a pragmatist, who recognizes that browsers implement standards 
differently (or partially, or not at all) and that it is the job of the Web 
designer to make pages work anyway. Thus, his book includes lots of explicit 
and tightly focused tips (with code) that have to do with bamboozling non-
compliant browsers into behaving as they should, without tripping up more 
compliant browsers. There's lots of coverage of design and testing tools 
that can aid in the creation of good-looking, standards-abiding documents. --
David Wall

Topics covered: Why Web standards (such as XHTML, CSS, ECMAScript, and DOM) 
are good for everyone, and why site designers and browser makers should move 
towards standards compliance. 


From the Publisher
If ever there were an author who could make web standards exciting, it?s 
Jeffrey Zeldman. His light and humorous writing style make for such an 
engaging read. It?s only after you stop reading that you realize how much 
you?re learning. What?s more, you?re not just learning -- you?re learning 
from THE ABSOLUTE BEST web standards guy there is. 

Daily, Zeldman practices what he preaches, and in this book, he openly 
shares all he knows. In no time, you?ll be saving... read more 


Book Description


You code. And code. And code. You build only to rebuild. You focus on making 
your site compatible with almost every browser or wireless device ever put 
out there. Then along comes a new device or a new browser, and you start all 
over again. 

You can get off the merry-go-round. 

It's time to stop living in the past and get away from the days of spaghetti 
code, insanely nested table layouts, tags, and other redundancies that 
double and triple the bandwidth of even the simplest sites. Instead, it's 
time for forward compatibility.

Isn't it high time you started designing with web standards?

Standards aren't about leaving users behind or adhering to inflexible rules. 
Standards are about building sophisticated, beautiful sites that will work 
as well tomorrow as they do today. You can't afford to design tomorrow's 
sites with yesterday's piecemeal methods. 

Jeffrey teaches you to: 

Slash design, development, and quality assurance costs (or do great work in 
spite of constrained budgets)
Deliver superb design and sophisticated functionality without worrying about 
browser incompatibilities 
Set up your site to work as well five years from now as it does today 
Redesign in hours instead of days or weeks 
Welcome new visitors and make your content more visible to search engines 
Stay on the right side of accessibility laws and guidelines 
Support wireless and PDA users without the hassle and expense of multiple 
versions 
Improve user experience with faster load times and fewer compatibility 
headaches 
Separate presentation from structure and behavior, facilitating advanced 
publishing workflows 





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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful: 

 Great Book, June 28, 2003 
 Reviewer: Sylvan Wallach (see more about me) from New York, NY USA  
This is the book I have been waiting for! The reams of pages which I have 
printed from various lists can mostly be discarded because Zeldman's book 
contains or refers to just about everything needed. Zeldman remarks that 
99.9 % of web sites are obsolete. (More recently stated to be about 99.4%!) 
This book is for the designers of those sites. 
First let me say that Zeldman writes in an engaging, humorous style. And 
thankfully he takes an easygoing approach to the use of standards and 
accessibility. As he points out, there is a continuum from no standards and 
no accessibility to rigid adherence to standards and complete accessibility. 
We are free to place ourselves where appropriate on this continuum. Yet 
Zeldman makes a compelling case for standards.
A 436 page book cannot be a treatise on everything. Yet Zeldman manages to 
give enough coverage to enable one to create web sites which use CSS, meet 
standards, are accessible, and can be viewed in all common browsers.

Throughout the book there are historical materials and references to sources 
and fuller discussions. Among the topics covered are XHTML, CSS basics, the 
DTD, the Dom and doc type switching. There is extensive discussion of 
browser problems and how to overcome them. Especially useful is a rather 
full discussion of font sizing. And a good chapter on accessibility. 
This is a practical book and Zeldman takes you step by step through the 
process of developing a site from a given design-a site which makes full use 
of CSS, meets standards and is accessible. Chapter 9 contains a brief 
introduction to CSS. Chapters 8 and 10 which describe the construction of a 
the aforementioned web site in detail is worth careful study.
To Zeldman's credit, the page uses one table for basic layout; Zeldman is no 
purist and supports use of the best tools available considering the present 
state of browsers. 


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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful: 

 Easier, Faster, Cheaper, May 30, 2003 
 Reviewer: nutellaconsumer (see more about me) from Swarthmore, PA USA  
Jeffrey Zeldman makes a very compelling case for designing using web 
standards. None of the technologies he talks about are particularly new, yet 
designers and developers have been slow to embrace them.

Zeldman takes us on a brief history lesson to give context to the good stuff 
that follows. Real world examples are then used to demonstrate the power and 
simplicity of using standards to create web documents. With clear 
explanation, backed up with learned commentary and sensible compromises, 
Zeldman introduces the reader to XHTML and CSS. Forward-thinking techniques, 
such as rules-based design, show the reader how easy it is to create 
documents that work in any web device, not just Internet Explorer.

This book will be useful to any designer or developer who wants to make 
their life an awful lot easier, and is an excellent partner to Eric 
Meyer's "Eric Meyer on CSS," by the same publisher, where more of the 
techniques discussed in the book are explored. 


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All Customer Reviews
Average Customer Review:  
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 Useless book, don't waste your money, May 3, 2004 
 Reviewer: njdj  
This is the worst technical book I've ever read (and I've read thousands in 
my career).
It starts with 150 pages of advocacy: why it's a good idea to design with 
web standards. Mr Zeldman: if I wasn't already convinced that designing with 
web standards was a good idea, why would I buy a book called "Designing with 
Web Standards"?
The author is one of those humor-impaired people who think they are witty. 
Example: "If changing tag fashions were all there was to it, ...this book 
would be filled with delicious tofu recipes. Like tofu honey pie with 
blueberries. Yum! It's even better if you use cream cheese instead of tofu. 
And sugar - lots of sugar. And butter and eggs - don't forget the eggs."
If you enjoy reading drivel like that, you might like this book. Perhaps it 
should have been titled "Jokes that never made it to the Tonight Show". But 
if you want to read about designing with CSS and XHTML, don't waste your 
time on it. 


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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful: 

 Straight dope, May 1, 2004 
 Reviewer: A reader from Lincoln, Nebraska  
Zeldman is revered in web-design circles. In fact, most aspiring web jockeys 
aspire principally to remain in his good graces. Have a look through the 
reviews - there are two kinds. The 4 and 5 star reviews are written by the 
ingratiating suck-ups hoping to win Zeldman's favor. The 1 star reviews are 
by those with the kahones to tell it like it is - there's no content in this 
garbage. It is the total abandonment of substance in favor of style - and 
not the CSS sort you're hoping for. It's all edge, attitude and posturing, 
giving the suck-ups what they crave.

You need a book that will show you how to do constructive things. You don't 
need to submit to a cult of personality, which is all Zeldman is. 


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 Nearly perfect, April 15, 2004 
 Reviewer: Brian Stork (see more about me) from Seattle, WA United States  
Zeldman is a great writer and the book is a page-turner. He tells you that 
everything you've been doing is bad, but it's OK because that's just the way 
things develop. Instead of crying on the past, he helps you get excited 
about the future. The only thing (and I mean only thing) I wanted but didn't 
get from the book was: more technical details on CSS. I suppose that's what 
a pocket-reference is for, though. After opening the doors to the incredible 
power of the XHTML/CSS design, I was going nuts trying to find out how to 
tell CSS what I wanted. 


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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful: 

 Almost perfect, April 14, 2004 
 Reviewer: Michael Lugassy (see more about me) from Ra'anana, Israel  
A great "Starter-Kit" for XHTML, CSS, light-weight coding and web standard! 
However, it's a pitty that Jeffrey decided to waste ink on practically 150 
pages on the history of browsers, web standards and why you should use them. 
Honestly - I bought this book because I KNOW I should use standards, no need 
to convince me again ;-)

I would gladly trade in those 150 pages for a more in-depth coverage of CSS. 


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