Matthew MacDonald

The advent of HTML5 enabled much advancement in the design of Internet apps. New markup went hand-in-hand with improvements in JavaScript and CSS3. Together, these set the course for web design up to the present (at least, in 2021). This book, though last updated in 2014, still presents the clearest explanation of these technological advances. However, to access this clarity, the reader has to overlook copious references to outdated browser versions along with older (but still working) show more versions of JavaScript code.

MacDonald takes us through how to use HTML5 and more importantly, how it helps us write more effective webpages. Some of this information is already “out there” in the web community, but this book is thorough enough to contain several nuanced pearls. For instance, it covers HTML5 syntax and the canvas element particularly well.

Accompanying technologies JavaScript and CSS3 are addressed in detail in the main text. Appendices cover introductions to these topics, so the reader doesn’t need to worry if she/he is unfamiliar with either or both. MacDonald’s clear writing shows an uncanny ability to get readers up-to-speed on details of all of these languages, each with unique issues.

Even though seven years is an eternity in the world of tech, I found much of this text still relevant to me as a web developer. Of course, I wish the text could be updated to cover current browsers and breaking issues, but the underlying technology hasn’t changed that much in the recent past. This work can easily be helpful to software developers as well as IT project managers who want to know what’s technologically feasible. HTML5 is a lighter topic as far as software goes, and MacDonald’s writing style is very accessible. This combination makes the book accessible to a wider audience of those involved in software. (Aren’t most of us involved to some degree these days?)

Overall, this work can still empower readers to master the nuances of HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS3. Even after developing web software for decades, I still picked up several insights and inspirations for thought. If you read this text, I hope you do as well. show less

For someone who's read a lot on psychology & brain science, not tons new here. But a nice mini-reference with a fun conversational style and a few "party trick" bits.

O'Reilly Publishing provided me access to an electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Matthew writes this book as if the reader has no previous experience with coding and even no experience with really understanding how the web works, i.e. how servers render webpages and understanding how a URL works. So if you have lots of experience with these areas then this book probably isn't for you. If however, you've never designed a webpage before or it's been a long time since you've coded show more this is the book that you want to pick up. The book is divided into five parts:

Welcome to the web--which covers the basics of how the web works, basic HTML, and uploading your webpage to the web
Building better webpages--covers how to use CSS, add images to the website, and creating pages
Connecting with your audiences
Website Frills--learning and using JavaScript for basic tasks
Appendixes

So by the end of the book the reader is able to know how a webpage works, design their own basic one (and know some good practices for doing so), and learning a little bit beyond the basics with JavaScript. The book is also accompanied by a website for future updates and an appendixes with online resources for learning more HTML and websites mentioned in the chapters for finding additional resources.

Having previous experience designing webpages I started reading and reviewing this book as a chance to find a guide that would be a handy reference or a bit of a refresher course when my mind decided to go to sleep. The good: Each chapter is written in a clear, easy to understand format that covers the basics of getting started. The bad: I did have a few problems with some of the information given and how it was worded. First is that it seems jumpy in some places, he wants you to swim before you can walk. For example, he starts off with saying create your first webpage and see how it looks in the browser before really discussing how everything is set up. I get that he wants to provide an example, but I would have told them to take a look at a simple webpage and pointed out the elements to the page first.

He also doesn't really cover some of the basic programs well, such as FTP applications and text editors. With FTP programs he just hopes that you're web provider lets you do it via the browser. For text editors he only highlights three free programs and misses some really popular ones, such as TextWrangler, textpad+++, or NetBeans. He also seemed to indicate that the pay ones were better if you were doing more complicated things, which just isn't quite true. It was just a bit disappointing to me perhaps, because I come with experience with webdesign. That being said for someone that is a complete novice at webdesign the book does cover the basics well so that anyway, even a person that has just started using a computer the week before, could pick up the book and begin building a webpage.

Even though it does have a few problems, it's still a good basic book for the beginner or a good refresher for someone that hasn't done webpage design in a while. If you're looking to get into depth with CSS or JavaScript I would recommend one of O'Reilly's other books, such as CSS: The Definitive Guide or Head First JavaScript. show less

O'Reilly Publishing provided me access to an electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

When I start looking at books on programming languages, such as HTML5, I look for a few different things. 1) Easy to read and understand language
2) Clear cut, easy to follow (and correct) examples of code
3) Good additional resources to look at
4) Layout and organization of chapters and subtopics flows well
5) And depending upon the language, an in-depth look at how it works.
While this book doesn't show more offer an in-depth look at every aspect of HTML5 (it is meant for beginners) it does meet the first three criteria that I look for and mostly meets the clear organizational path.

This book doesn't give an in-depth look at HTML5 because what Matthew is trying to do is provide a basic introduction to the various tools and components of HTML5 and how you might be able to use them in your day-to-day work. And this is where the book excels. Matthew breaks down the book into three broad themes (meet the new language, creating modern webpages, building web apps with desktop smarts) and further broken down into 12 chapters on each of these broader themes. Plus he includes a great 4th section with appendices and other additional resources and real world examples of code in use.

In the first section Matthew does a great job of explaining how HTML5 came into being versus the continuation of XHTML and how W3C works to approve code. This is important to understand in the context of this book as not every standard developed by the committee or shown in this book works with every browser at this time (there is at least one that only works with one browser thus far. Matthew does a good job of letting the reader know which standard will work with which browsers and when, if ever, the standard might be widely adapted. He also does a good job of breaking down the various standards that have the most real world use in building webpages, such as the discussion on semantic tags in Chapter 2. Matthew provides clear cut examples of code and explains how you might be able to use them.

This book is helpful to have handy just to see some of the features and capabilities of what can be accomplished with HTML5. It is just meant as a basic introduction so if you don't have previous experience with designing webpages or understand HTML, CSS, or JavaScript (all of which Matthew says you need to understand his book) then check out a basic book on building a webpage. If you need more in-depth knowledge of HTML5, want greater understanding of the language, or just examples of how specific sections of HTML5 work you may want to check the webbased documentation. Overall this is a nice book to have handy to see the different types of things that you can do, examples provided, and other references that Matthew lists. show less