Designing for the Web… Win! Win!
One of the last tweets I saw today stated: “Reading is hazardous for your stupidity…”. Thanks for the message pal! Looking back at what has been hazardous for my stupidity through the past week is the PDF book I bought off Five Simple Steps by Mark Boulton.
What I like with Web design guru Mark Boulton is his transversal view of web design and his direct and concise way of explaining the underlying design concepts. It reads with a great pace while giving you “to the point” information on webdesign in a 100+ PDF printable, personalised book! This is another example of a great Web design book to own. You can read other writings from Mark Boulton on his blog.
Having said this, the Web Design Bureau of Mauritius is offering 2 (yes TWO) copies of Mark Boulton’s book. Just leave a comment on this post about your experience of “learning” from books (most web designers, designers or programmers do so at a certain point in their lives) to enter the contest which will end on Monday 2nd of March 2009. I can assure you that you’ll even love the book’s layout!
Category: Books, CSS, Design, Elsewhere, Inspiration, Standards
Books have been very important for me, especially when I began to learn about design and web. I read a lot of design books to teach myself and they have taught me most of what I know today.
Even though books aren’t the be all, end all way to learn, I find it easier to learn what I can from a book and then have someone explain it too. This was I can get a basic knowledge beforehand.
I learned a lot from online tutorials and by discovering things by myself. I had to learn ASP.NET at my job and we had a book about it and it helped me a lot. I think there are some things that you can learn faster if you read a book about it.
I never read a book about webdesign or any thing about websites
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Books have always served as a guide for mental expansion. When there is a new subject/topic, books operate as blueprints which allow new skills, techniques, and thought patterns to be created (or destroyed) in the mind.
I hope I’ll have a chance to learn from this eBook..
Ah!
There is a lot of research that goes into writing a book and hence the greater the amount of knowledge you gain out of it. Also, nothing beats the flexibility that comes along.
I have to agree with a lot of the comments; I find ebooks these days to be the natural transition for books.
It’s so handy just popping it onto a flash drive and taking it with you, instead of lugging around a book in your litttle handbag all day.
And you can easily skip or navigate to a preferred section in a fraction of a second.
Another useful thing is you can print it as and when you please, pull out quotes and stick them on your wall for inspiration!
Online tutorials/reading is great for understanding little snippets of information or instructions. But you cannot beat a physical copy of a document/book to give your full attention to.
The book I am reading at the moment is ‘How to be a graphic designer without losing you soul’ by Adrian Shaughnessy – http://tinyurl.com/agre45. It is really well written by a graphic design professional and not an industry bystander. I hope that ‘Designing for the web’ is just a good a read. I really love the design and images posted on Flickr, a very slick document Mark.
I prefer learning from a book because there are (for me) fewer distractions. With an e-book or pdf I find that I don’t give it my undivided attention because my mind is often focused on the other things I should be working on at my computer.
With a physical book, I can take it away from the computer and often get a little better perspective.
Either learnin from a book and learnin from ebooks/the web has its good and negaitve aspects… i cant sit and read on screen for hours so i prefer to just sit down and grab a book… and its less distructive
also a good thing to learn from are podcasts for me… so for every situation theres an opportunity to learn….
I personally adore learning from books. I obtained my initial education at a tech school with a less than satisfactory curriculum and found out early that teaching myself was the only way to get where I wanted to be. Even with all of the tutorial and instructional sites available on the web, which were and are extremely helpful, nothing can replace the feel and experience that a real paper and ink book bring to the table. I can’t tell you how many hours I have spent glancing down at a good book on my desk between my arms as I typed and worked on improving my skill-set and understanding of my field. Also there are not to many sites out there that focus on learning the basics of design theory and good aesthetics. Whereas you can find good books on almost any thing you might want to learn. Thanks for allowing us this opportunity to share out passion for independent book learning!!
I’ve had mixed success learning from books. While I treasure some print-based reference guides and tutorials, in this highly web-focused society in which we leave, the printed word seems so unbearably static at times. Open Source solutions (and, in many cases, closed source solutions) may change so rapidly as to obsolesce printed material very quickly, necessitating an expensive, updated edition or tedious trips to updates-and-errata web pages.
Nevertheless, there are books that stand the test of time, and (perhaps this is antiquated, but it’s me) I seem to be at my best when I have a book on my desk under a computer monitor, doing work or learning some new technique. Being a bit of a bibliophile, I’m always on the look-out for a new addition to my shelves of printed knowledge, but I’ll always supplement my collection with more dynamic, web-based content.
“most web designers, designers or programmers do so at a certain point in their lives”
That’s excactly the point where i’m at now. Every book where i can get my hands on will be read thoroughly! My intention: Get smart, get better and be succesfull.
Man! I need one!
After reading Jeffrey Zeldman’s book, “designing with web standards”, my eyes were opened to a whole new world of making things work on the web. But reading about web design isn’t the only reading I enjoy. I also love fiction, non-fiction, cook books and the occasional wired magazine article.
Thanks.
I am trying very hard to pull myself together and do something useful with my life, I have recently started focusing on some technical books, mostly dealing with PHP, MySQL, Java Script and CSS, but I am seriously missing out on the design side of things. I have recently enrolled into a short course in Graphic Design to be able to think more visually and to be able to deliver an experience a more complete experience. It would be very helpful to read a book focusing on bringing those 2 worlds together.
On the other side I would like to point out that reading from a book, has it’s on unique feel to it, I don’t think that I will ever live to see the day were I will be as comfortable reading from a screen, as I do from a book. There is always this special connection on an emotional and psychological level, as it feels more personal. As well as it gives you the freedom of reading while actually being able to implement certain tips and tricks, without having to keep switching between multiple screens, as well as the freedom to read the book while traveling on the tube.
In the end I would like to thanks you, for offering us all the possibility to increase our knowledge.
Good luck to everyone and me
Hi,
I would echo previous comments in that I also find reading from a physical medium, be it a book, newspaper, or magazine to be a far more personal experience than reading from a digital source. Somehow you feel more involved and connected to the subject matter. Maybe it’s because it engages our other senses – you can feel the book in your hands and you have to turn the pages. Maybe I’m just more comfortable with normal books because that’s how I learnt when I was a child – and wasn’t staring at a computer screen like I do now all day long.
Over the years I have taught myself new skills by looking at tutorials on the web, books, and pdf books. I have to say that I’m always dipping into the books, whereas the pdfs end up being forgotten about once you’ve downloaded them and read them the first time.
Many thanks for running this competition, and my best regards to you all.
Jason
Let me in, please!
There is something about the physical touch of books, they are still more intuitive to go through and i don’t have to deal with Bill Gate’s Windows Waiting Time when i want something–books give it to me straight away. Even when i design a new website, i go to a paper and pencil, not the computer.
Hi,
Books are the starting point of my learning process. They have the benefit of being portable so that you can read them everywhere you like.
I have noticed that for some reason I spent to much time online searching for valid information about a topic while having read a book about that same topic. I consider a book the starting point of a journey of information digging and exploration.
And some books look nice designwise so that can even be a source of inspiration itself.
Jan
I’m a long time network engineer and computer nerd with a huge artistic side. I’ve decided to branch out more towards the design / artistry side of things and improve my designing skills. I’ve am reading “The principles of Beautiful Design” by Jason Beaird. It’s great and really helps get the other side of my brain to stop being limited by the technical side.
[...] back to the issue of web design education, a lot has come out from the ongoing contest to win a copy of Mark Boulton’s “Designing for the web”. Read the comments and you’ll get a great view of how most people in the industry have [...]
Hello!
I think, that books are a must if you want to learn something well. No matter, if you are starting with book or trying to boost your skills. And as Brigham said, there is realy something about the physical touch of books.
I have both good and bad experiences.
One of the things that sometimes is bad is that books focus on explaining what others have done, and do not show how to use the same techniques with innovation.
(so are books that tech you upon copying and dont really give a clear understanding of subjects. because a clear understanding would be able to modifyit)
When they do, they usually talk with slang that not every designer understands (especially designers who are not from US; and fail to explain correctly to who the book is for and the clear expected background)
On the good part, i’ve always found out more clear to read a book whose writer talks in a friendly way, they’re almost as a personal talk and this experience to experience envroment its great.
Also, They are a portable solution if you have no internet, the book is always there, and if it is a PDF it always on the computer even offline.
And as a plus reading excersices the brain more than tv,s videos etc.
Between all things i have noted those are the most importatn to me (i hope im not forgetting any)
beWell
GBY
bao!
Every time I want to learn a new skill the first thing I do is read bit about it on the web to get a 10,000 feet high view of the most important concepts.
Then I search for relevant books, read some reviews and get sample chapters if they’re available (and mostly there’s always a sample chapter and table of contents of technology and web design books.
Once I selected the book (or books) that I feel are more best suited for me and the timeframe I have, I purchase them and study.
Having good books available and reading blogs has been my main source of education in the past 10 years, and In my opinion THE ONLY THING BETTER THAN ONE GREAT BOOK when you’re learning by yourself, IS MORE THAN ONE GREAT BOOK.
Then there are books that you just need to have, because they allow you inside the thought process of an expert. Those I buy even if I already know the concepts, because I can always learn something from them.
As soon as I learned that Mark was writing this book I got on his announcement list. I hope I can get it free, because the exchange rate between the UK pound and the Argentine Peso makes these purchases really expensive to me.
I have often found that technical/design related books contain information that would otherwise be hard to find while googling the interwebs.
The books from Taschen (illustrating several websites with sceenshots) also have the advantage of being a great source of inspiration. You could find the same content on one of the many css galleries but having an offline view of the online world makes me admire some of the great design work even more.
More often then not I will look for more in depth information on a topic I’ve read in a book.
Reading a book is nice, searching for further detailed information online is good but the combination of the two creates innovation!
[...] the Web is already considered as a stepping stone in Web design and I hope that the winners of the PDF book giveaway will take great pleasure in scouring its pages. The contest was a real success and it is a pleasure [...]