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codywalton · Jan 4, 2005, 10:35 PM

Did a forum search for this. Didn't find anything. If I missed the answer in another thread, please just post me a link to that one. Thanks.

So I've been building web sites for almost 10 years now, but I never got into CSS. Recently a friend pointed me to www.csszengarden.com , and some of the designs are uber-impressive, and now I really want to learn CSS. I've done some futzing around with it in dreamweaver, and had limited success. But I still don't understand how it works 100%. So does anyone know of a good book or online guide that explains all the functionality and abilities of CSS, in a way a designer, not a developer, can understand them. Particularly the "float" and "clear" commands, and how they interact with each other, and how you can use them to position your div tags.

Thanks.

eyevaan · Jan 5, 2005, 02:56 PM

are you using CSSedit or BBedit or some program of that level?

Just curious - I keep being told not use DW to do that level of coding - too much crap for the purists... but I am lost without the GUI which is probably indicative of being lost in some other ways too... but that is a lounge topic.

mydog8mymac · Jan 5, 2005, 03:26 PM

I've heard the same about the code in GoLive. I'd love to be directed to a good source. Good post, codywalton!

eyevaan · Jan 5, 2005, 03:51 PM

pick up the thread from the GUI customization thread... strange but there were many results and great suggestions.

iMOTOR · Jan 10, 2005, 08:20 PM

Originally posted by codywalton:
Recently a friend pointed me to www.csszengarden.com , and some of the designs are uber-impressive,

That's a cool site, however, I find it interesting that they're advocating css and its reliability, yet one of their pages had several rendering errors in safari.

MacHarbor · Jun 2, 2005, 12:04 AM

I am currently rebuilding my website using SubEthaEdit and CSSEdit, and I must say, I am NEVER going back to GoLive or DreamWeaver. It is SO much more clean to write your own code (but be sure to have the pages mapped out on paper w/ coding notes).

For example with my website: All of the pages are going to have the exact same layout, but will have vastly different colors and graphics. I have 2 external CSS documents.

1) layout.css (accessed by all of the pages, and sets up the basic layout).
2) local.css (accessed by all pages within a specific scope (subject A, subject B, subject C, each have their own local.css files)

If I need to do page specific CSS, I just define that within the page itself.

Since they "cascade" I can make changes to anything that was already defined in layout.css within local.css, without actually having to mess with layout.css.

I also made sure to make a CSS file specifically for IE, since IE doesn't always want to look the same as the other browsers (this is where Microsoft DOES "think different").

I became very angry with GoLive since it always wanted to take control of CSS from you and do it's own thing. Plus it just never felt the same as editing with the MacOS Classic versions of GoLive.

A great book that has helped me in leaps and bounds is Elizabeth Castro's "HTML For the World Wide Web, 5th Edition (with XHTML and CSS)". I was able to make a really nice collapsable Javascript/CSS menu in under an hour. It also goes into WML for Cell Phones with internet access, which I soooo want to try sooner or later. I run a self-owned video store and having small previews of new videos on the website that could be previewed on a cell phone would simply be awesome.

You do need to watch out with CSS if you happen to see alot of older browsers access your site (check your web sites usage stats if you can, most of the browsers that hit my site are 5.0 or above, so I consult the supported CSS/HTML/Javascript/image features of those browsers before I add anything to my pages).

litespeed59 · Jun 17, 2005, 08:10 PM

About 4 months ago, I too became interested in XHTML+CSS after seeing CSS Zen Garden, and I will never turn back. Here are some websites and other resources that I have found useful:

Simplebits.com - Check out Dan's book - excellent!
StopDesign.com
MezzoBlue.com
AListApart.com
StyleGala.com

I recently switched over to a Mac and have so far taken a liking to skEdit for editing XHTML/CSS/PHP and uploading files to a web server via SFTP.

ashtoash · Jun 27, 2005, 03:16 PM

Yes.. because Safari can do no wrong? Safari screws up css STANDARDS more often than any browser including IE. What they are advocating is a good thing. Maybe you should petition Apple to more rapidly deploy COMPLETE support for CSS standards set over 2 years ago...

The best of the best CSS:
http://www.stylegala.com
http://www.cssvault.com
http://www.cssbeauty.com

Originally Posted by iMOTOR

That's a cool site, however, I find it interesting that they're advocating css and its reliability, yet one of their pages had several rendering errors in safari.