Rating:  - I didn't know you could do that...
I've often said that I like the O'Reilly "cookbook" format for getting ideas and solving issues I didn't know I had. CSS Cookbook (2nd edition) by Christopher Schmitt is another one of those books that will earn space on my shelf at work...
Contents: General; Web Typography; Images; Page Elements; Lists; Links and Navigation; Forms; Tables; Page Layouts; Print; Hacks, Workarounds, and Troubleshooting; Designing with CSS; Resources; CSS 2.1 Properties and Proprietary Extensions; CSS 2.1 Selectors, Pseudo-Classes, and Pseudo-Elements; Styling of Form Elements; Index
The "cookbook" formula has a number of recipes on how to do certain things with CSS. It starts with a problem statement, a brief and concise solution, and then a discussion about how it works and factors that come into play. Some of the recipes are really basic, like setting the size of type on a page. In a case like that, the answer is simply font-size with a discussion of how that works. In other cases, the recipe is much more advanced, such as applying specific CSS properties to the IE 5.x browser to handle it's quirky box model implementation. That one is much longer, as there's more to it than just reading the specs or a basic tutorial...
My only disappointment here is that some of the included items are *really* basic. For instance, the General chapter seems to be a basic CSS guide formatted as a series of recipes. A recipe of using comments in your CSS file, while a legitimate question, is one that I'd expect someone to know if they are picking up a book like this. I would have preferred see that space be used for less tutorial-like information and more "meat". Still, having said that, it's still a book that I'd feel comfortable with having around...
Once you're past the "what is CSS" phase, this is a good book to spend time with. It will either answer the "how do I do that" questions or spur the "I hadn't thought of doing that" moments...
Rating:  - This is a very good, practical guide for putting CSS to use
O'Reilly's other books on CSS tend to be more for reference and learning, but this book, by Christopher Schmitt, contains good, practical advice for putting CSS to use. And as a bonus, this book covers the brand-new CSS 2.1 conventions. Like other "Cookbook" tech books, there are plenty of real-world cases and blocks of code that designers and developers can use or adapt in their own situations. There are plenty of "Hello World" examples that will be useful to those new to CSS, but there is some advanced material, too, for those at intermediate levels looking to spread their wings a bit. This volume bookends quite nicely with the "Eric Meyer on CSS" books.
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