Stylin' with CSS A Designer's Guide

by Wyke-Smith, Charles

• ISBN13: 9780321305251
• ISBN10: 0321305256
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-04-26
• Publisher: New Riders

Summary

Cascading Style Sheets enable you to rapidly create web designs that can be shared by hundreds of web pages, accelerating development times and centralizing text and layout information for easy editing and updates. Stylin’ with CSS teaches you everything you need to know start using CSS in your web development work, from the basics of markup of your content and styling text, through to creating multi-column page layouts without the use of tables. Learn how to create interface components, such as drop-down menus, navigation links, and animated graphical buttons, using only CSS – no JavaScript required. Discover how to design code that will work on the latest standard-compliant browsers, while working around the quirks of the older browsers. With a mastery of CSS, your web design capabilities will move to a new level, and everything you need to know to get your started and build your skills is right here in this book. You’ll be stylin’ in no time!

Author Biography

Charles Wyke-Smith who has been creating Web sites since 1994, and is currently Director of Production at Nacio, a corporate hosting and development company in Novato, California, that focuses on user experience, information architecture, and interface design. He has worked as a Web design consultant for such companies as Wells Fargo, ESPN Videogames, and The University of San Francisco. Wyke-Smith has also taught multimedia and interface design and spoken at many industry conferences.

Table of Contents

Introduction	x
XHTML: Giving Structure to Content	2	(26)
Sorry, IDWIMIE	4	(3)
The Times They Are A-Changing	7	(3)
A Legacy of Kluges	7	(1)
Let's Play Spot the Content!	8	(1)
The Future Will Be Here Soon	9	(1)
XHTML and How to Write It	10	(18)
XHTML Markup Rules	11	(6)
Understanding Markup	17	(8)
Document Hierarchy: Meet the XHTML Family	25	(3)
How CSS Works	28	(38)
The Three Ways to Style Your Document	30	(5)
Inline Styles	30	(2)
Embedded Styles	32	(1)
Linked Styles	33	(2)
Anatomy of a CSS Rule	35	(1)
Writing CSS Rules	35	(1)
Targeting Tags Within the Document Hierarchy	36	(14)
Using Contextual Selectors	37	(3)
Working with Child Selectors	40	(1)
Adding Classes and IDs	41	(1)
Simple Use of a Class	42	(1)
Contextual Class Selectors	43	(3)
Introducing IDs	46	(1)
The Difference Between IDs and Classes	46	(1)
The Universal Selector	47	(1)
The Adjacent Sibling Selector	48	(1)
Attribute Selectors	48	(2)
Summary of Selectors	50	(1)
Pseudo-Classes	50	(3)
Anchor Link Pseudo-Classes	50	(2)
Other Useful Pseudo-Classes	52	(1)
Pseudo-elements	53	(1)
Inheritance	54	(1)
The Cascade	55	(5)
Sources of Styles	55	(2)
The Cascade Rules	57	(3)
Rule Declarations	60	(6)
Numerical Values	61	(2)
Color Values	63	(3)
Stylin' Fonts and Text	66	(34)
Specifying Fonts in CSS	69	(3)
Introducing Font Collections	69	(3)
Exploring Font Families	72	(4)
Using Embedded Styles (for Now)	74	(1)
Setting the Font Family for the Entire Page	75	(1)
Sizing Fonts	76	(7)
Inherited styles in nested tags	81	(2)
Font Properties	83	(3)
Font-Style Property	83	(1)
Font-Weight Property	84	(1)
Font-Variant Property	85	(1)
The Font Property Shorthand	85	(1)
Text Properties	86	(11)
Text-Indent Property	88	(2)
Letter-Spacing Property	90	(1)
Word-Spacing Property	91	(1)
Text-Decoration Property	91	(1)
Text-Align Property	92	(1)
Line-Height Property	92	(2)
Text-Transform Property	94	(1)
Vertical-Align Property	95	(2)
Using Font and Text Styles	97	(3)
Positioning Elements	100	(24)
Understanding the Box Model	102	(7)
The Box Border	103	(3)
The Box Padding	106	(1)
The Box Margins	106	(2)
Collapsing Margins	108	(1)
How Big Is a Box?	109	(3)
The Position Property	112	(5)
Static Positioning	112	(1)
Relative Positioning	113	(1)
Absolute Positioning	114	(1)
Fixed Positioning	115	(1)
Positioning Context	116	(1)
Floating and Clearing	117	(5)
The Float Property	117	(2)
The Clear Property	119	(3)
The Display Property	122	(2)
Basic Page Layout	124	(24)
A Simple Two-Column Layout	126	(4)
Three-Column Layout	130	(5)
Three-Column Layout with Header	135	(4)
Three-Column Layouts with Float and Clear	139	(9)
The Alsett Clearing Method	144	(4)
Advanced Page Layout	148	(24)
A Digression on Backgrounds	150	(3)
Background Basics	151	(2)
Building Full-Length Columns	153	(9)
Faux-Column Technique	154	(6)
Columns for Fluid Center Layouts	160	(2)
A Robust Fluid Layout	162	(5)
A Template With Negative Margins	167	(5)
Creating Interface Components	172	(48)
Understanding Lists	174	(12)
Styling Lists	176	(8)
Basic Link Styling	184	(2)
Creating CSS-Based Menus	186	(9)
Horizontal Navigation Components	186	(7)
The Hover Behavior for Internet Explorer	193	(2)
Creating Drop-Down Menus	195	(8)
Marking Up Drop-Down Menus	195	(8)
Making Multiple Level Drop-Downs	203	(5)
Rollovers with Graphical Backgrounds	205	(3)
Developing Forms	208	(9)
Understanding the Form Element	208	(5)
Adding Radio Buttons and Check Boxes	213	(2)
Creating a Form Select	215	(1)
Two Final Touches	216	(1)
Implementing Search	217	(3)
Building Web Sites	220	(34)
Getting Started With the Snergs Site	222	(5)
Setting Up the Folder Structure	223	(3)
Creating the Site Architecture	226	(1)
Modifying the Markup	227	(19)
Creating the Header	230	(2)
Creating the Left Navigation	232	(2)
Styling the Right Column	234	(4)
Styling the News Links	238	(3)
Creating the Content Area	241	(1)
Creating a Caption for the Main Image	241	(2)
Styling the Footer	243	(3)
Cleanup Time	246	(6)
Constraining Min and Max Widths	251	(1)
In Closing...	252	(2)
Appendix : CSS Properties and Values	254	(12)
Index	266