Rating:  - HTML & XHTML
This is a good book for moderate to experienced computer users with programming experience. The code snipets are helpful to illustrate the topic, but a less experienced person could easily get confused.
Rating:  - HTML & XHTML: The Definitive Guide, Fifth Edition
I am getting ready to build my own website and this book has helped immensely and I would recommend it to anyone who is looking for a good book to introduce them to the language of HTML.
Rating: - Good place to start
I first read this years ago when I was first learning HTML and had no developement experience. It was a great way to start off, easy reading and easy to look up information I needed. I still look things up when I need a quick refresher for a web page alteration. Not the book for someone looking for advanced knowledge.
Rating: - Always by my side
(originally published on www.last-child.com)
There are books you read that change your way of thinking (Designing with Web Standards), books your read for ideas (Usability: The Site Speaks for Itself), and books you keep within arm's reach at all times. This book, HTML and XHTML: The Definitive Guide, is one that you should always keep on your desk.
I'm saying this from experience. I'm a self-taught web programmer and have read over well over a dozen programming books during the past few years. This is the book that traveled with me from job to job. It's where I go to check on the proper use of tags and attributes. It's a well laid-out reference book that is actually interesting to read.
Who should get this book
This book is for those working directly with HTML code. It does not discuss programming languages, JavaScript, or CSS to any extent. However, it clearly defines how to use valid markup to build sites. I have found it invaluable for building forms and complex data tables. It's also a great foundation for those learning semantic markup from the beginning.
Rating: - Encyclopedic reference in need of updating
Now in its fifth edition, this encyclopedic tome published by O'Reilly and Associates badly needs an update since its last edition was published in 2002 and much has changed since then. However, it is still an essential reference to anyone who originates or modifies webpages. The HTML chapters are still excellent. The book starts with a history of HTML/XHTML/XML up to the time of the last edition. Next is a basic non-nonsense tutorial on writing webpages using HTML to get you started. It is only a chapter in length so that you understand what the skeleton of an HTML webpage looks like. Next are numerous chapters fleshing out what you can do to this basic skeleton of a webpage. This part starts with plain text and continues with images, multimedia, cascading style sheets, etc. This section is encyclopedic in that each tag is explained in detail. Its function is defined as well as its attributes, and an example is usually given showing how you would insert each tag in a webpage and the resulting output. The part of this book that really shows its age is the section on XML. It is really too basic to be of much use, and what is there is out of date by now. However, if you are just beginning with HTML this is still by far the best tutorial out there. No other book will do as good a job at teaching you the basics or providing the complete details for every HTML tag.
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