The Non-Designer's Web Book (2nd Edition)

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Summary: Essential reading for budding web designers
Review: As someone who's made a career out of web design for the past couple of years, I thought my sites were pretty good. After reading this book, I know they're going to be a lot better! I didn't think I needed any books on web design but after reading another book by the same author I thought I'd try this one out. It isn't full of HTML code, which I don't need, but it's full of excellent advice and tips. It was exactly what I wanted it to be. I found my head brimming with ideas and inspiration for new sites and for redesigning some of my old ones, making subtle and not so subtle improvements. I wish everyone who has a web page out there had read this book. The web would be a better place for it.

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Summary: Excellent Short Reference for Good Web Design (and Redesign)
Review: As a busy self-taught professional who does both Internet applications development and web design I'm always looking for very specific tools, skills, and methods to improve the quality, appearance, and consistency of my web work. This book, although featuring samples primarily on the Macintosh, is the best value for the dollar for the budding web designer, regardless of platform and develoment tools used. Its coverage of design elements, web promotion and marketing; graphics principles; and simply clarifying what one can do to make bad design become good design or to improve good design to excellent design was priceless. I obtain more knowledge (neatly collected and organized in this small book) in a shorter time than I've gotten out of much more difficult to read and more expensive treatments of the same topic. I recommend this book to anyone that has no formal design training yet would like to produce professional web content.

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Summary: Exceptional. The Norm for Ms. Williams
Review: Ms Williams has done it again, her writing style, power of communication, design sense is exceptional. The books interface: pairing the HTML with the graphic result is undoubtably the easiest method for learning, Unlike other HTML Tomes I find that her lessons stick. Tips on standard pitfalls and Web Page annoyances should be required reading for all Web designers. As always her thourough index allows for quick reference. Although geared for beginners and "non-designers" I dare anyone claim they haven't gained something from this book.

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Summary: A great investment for the new web designer.
Review: I was initially suspicious of Robin's book because of the slightly goofy layout and graphics, but they serve a purpose. I had always been frustrated by instructional books that claimed to be clear and concise but still managed to gloss-over some very fundamental things that lead to an understanding of the "big picture". Robin's book tells you exactly what you need to know, and then just a little bit more so that you really appreciate what you are learning. She provides a context for learning instead of just giving instructions. This is a very intelligently-written book and worth every penny. Well done!

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Summary: Superb starting point; answers questions so I can understand
Review: Great for the beginner and moderately experienced: those who want to make basic improvements to their existing Web pages or those who want to do it right from the start. Plenty of teach even the well-experienced. Also, as a Web Site manager, I lend this book to people who are getting started or need a little fine tuning. The chapters on images and basic design principles should be required reading for ALL creators of Web pages. The authors clearly thought long and hard about what people like us need to know to do things well and efficiently. Plus it's simply a good, fun, engaging read. Well done.

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Summary: Make the Web work for you
Review: This book is an invaluable, clearly and concisely written guide for those who want to segue basic print design skills to the Web. It's especially refreshing in that it's not loaded with pages and pages of repetitive jargon, exhaustive histories about how the Web and the Net developed, etc., that create filler in so many others of this genre. It's unique in that it sensibly helps map out the parameters, timelines and skills you need to get a well-designed site up and running quickly. If you want to create a well designed, organized and easy to navigate site up that will get and keep visitors, this book is for you.

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Summary: Worthwhile for both beginners and HTML wizards!
Review: Having thoroughly enjoyed _The_Non-Designer's_Design_Book_, I was eager to see Ms Williams' views on web-specific design. This book is everything I expected, and more. Both my older son (just getting his foot in the door of web design) and I (a programmer and HTML hacker for years) have already found valuable ideas and tips. The before-and-after examples are especially valuable in helping the reader understand the principles that the book teaches. If I could only have one book on web site/page design (and I have MANY!), this would be it.

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Summary: Another eye-opener! Great.
Review: Like the earlier non-designer's book, this title teaches in short steps with simple language concepts that you probably never thought about. A real confidence builder! Contains a good deal of reference information that I have turned to repeatedly. A great work.

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Summary: Worthy follow-up to the Non-Designer's Design Book
Review: After reading Ms. William's other Non-Designer's title, I was anxious to see what additional wisdom she brought to Web design. Her new book does not disappoint: Along with John Tollett, she has produced a beautifully-illustrated, informative, and funny primer on Web design. There is plenty in this book for more advanced Web designers, too, although they will be able to skip the introductory chapters. I especially appreciated the authors' generous spirit in critiqueing other Web sites, as opposed to the nasty "Webs-sites-that-suck" snipes so prevalent now.

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Summary: Excellent Instruction for Those Just Starting
Review: "The Non-Designer's Web Book, 2nd Edition" is perfect for those of you who want to build your own site but don't want to use one of the canned templates so many ISP's offer.
Ms. Williams advice is, as usual, right on target and very easy to understand. Her humor is understated and well placed, encouraging the reader to continue in the project at hand. The book has plenty of color illustrations and screen shots, and is peppered with great advice on creating graphics, getting your site listed, basic design principles, and even a few lessons on HTML coding, if you like.
Each chapter concludes with a short quiz to help cement the principles that were just taught, and her coverage (despite what some people have written) of the basics is just what is needed for those of you who have skipped over an idea or two and wonder just what the heck something such as the difference between search engines and directories are.
Starting on page 50 is a Ms. Williams takes you through setting up a page and the associated site, step by step, in a concise, easy to understand way. It covers such things as typing and formatting text, changing colors, creating links and adding an email link, adding graphics, setting up a table, explaining what frames are and how to use them, and finally, adding some HTML code, if you want. These topics are the very basics of web construction, and the author expounds on them in later chapters, but it's especially nice that she distilled them into a short, easy to read section (that is extremely well illustrated) so you don't have to hunt through the rest of the pages later.
Some people have taken exception to the Netscape emphasis. They fail to realize that when the book was written Netscape was still a big player, and that IE's implementation of standards left a lot to be desired. Also, someone has stated that there are big errors throughout the book, but I haven't found any, and the example the reviewer gave (directions to use a page-sized graphic as a background) doesn't exist. In fact, Ms. Williams stresses that's just want you DON'T want to do.
There is a slight Mac-bias, but it is slight, with plenty of screen shots of Windows software along with the appropriate instruction. Given that the design industry is predominately centered on the Mac platform, this preference is easily understood.
All in all, this is one of the best books out for learning the basics of setting up your web site, as the title implies. You won't go wrong with Robin William's books, and this is just one example of why: clear writing, excellent advice, easy to follow instruction.