Web Site Engineering: Beyond Web Page Design

Rating:
Summary: Simply methodically enlightening!
Review: Crucial or essential reading for web site designers and software engineers who are into web development. You can even consider keeping it as your primary reference book for years to come until the latest edition is out. Perhaps, earn itself a classic tag for people like me who collects great books.

Web Site Engineering: Beyond Web Page Design by Thomas A. Powell (Author), et al dissects the fundamentals of web design using software engineering perspective or context. I love the way it applies the concepts of software engineering into web site design.

No doubt I would purchase one. How about you?

Rating:
Summary: Really about Web Site Life Cycle Management & Sys Eng.
Review: I got this book to update my professional skills. My technical specialties are service delivery and production support, and my background is in traditional data center environments. With more than 25 years of mainframe and distributed computing I felt that I had better get up-to-date or I'd be left behind.

Based on the title I was expecting a book that would give me insights into how web sites are developed with an emphasis on capacity and performance planning. Although this wasn't exactly what I was looking for it seemed to be close enough to give a basis for extrapolating what I needed. As it turned out, the book provided me with exactly what I needed: a clear view into web site development and deployment that is framed in a life cycle structure.

It starts out with an overview of software engineering principles (not development techniques) and quickly emphasizes the need for process models. This is followed by some basics about the web, networking and how the web works. This is pretty fundamental stuff that can be safely skipped by experienced web developers who are interested in the process. Since I am not a developer and relatively new to the technology I liked this section.

The [system] engineering process begins in chapter 4, and follows a standard life cycle model for the remainder of the book. Problem definition, concept exploration and feasibility analysis are given standard treatment - this is systems analysis 101 material, but is thoroughly covered and a good refresher. The same holds true for the chapter on requirements analysis and specification. When you arrive at chapter 6, Designing the Web Site, the unique requirements of web design are highlighted and the book becomes very interesting. I like the way application and information are distinguished, and the emphasis placed on usability. This is a marked departure from how systems were developed during the early days in my career when the user interface and human factors were an afterthought - if they were thought of at all.

Chapter 7 is the only place in the book where any "web engineering" is addressed. I personally learned a lot from the discussions of client- and server-side technologies, tools and content management. However, an experienced web developer might find this material to be lightweight.

The rest of the book placed implementation, testing, promotion into production and ongoing management into a familiar context that faithfully follows traditional life cycle and production support methods. I was gratified to see the emphasis on testing, release and post-implementation management because I do not see these in practice when it comes to web implementations.

My view of web development and implementation prior to reading this book was that it is performed by extremely bright-but undisciplined-men and women who did not understand processes. This is based on personal observations of web projects - the projects all seemed to end after development and "thrown over the wall" to production support. Testing is hit-or-miss and there is no real release methodology. This approach usually results in web sites that are chronically broken, and if commerce is involved, do not have the trust of users.

This book provides a clear roadmap for "engineering" and implementing a web site the right way. It starts with proven processes and aligns them to the fast cycle times and rapid implementation needs that characterize information technology in today's world. If you are an IT or project manager this book will provide you with excellent guidelines for a web development and implementation methodology. If you are working in production support you need to get this book into the hands of the team who will surely try to slip their web site into your domain - this book will communicate your requirements to them in their language.

Rating:
Summary: A book for dummies
Review: This book doesn't quite live up to its title, but is nonetheless a significant step forward in the literature of web technology. It is one of the first books to treat the building of web sites as an exercise in software engineering, and is strong in describing how to apply an organized development methodology to the construction of a web site. Given that most Web books focus on the construction of pretty pages, this is a not an advance to be taken lightly.

Where it falls short is in the promise of actually teaching the reader how to architect a web-based system for high performance and scalable operation. Like most Web books, it focuses on the user interface aspects of the system, and relegates the much more difficult server and network architecture portions to a minor feature of the book.

Rating:
Summary: Not a serious book, even for managers.
Review: This book says it discusses a lot more than it really does. It will waste your time. There is no value in this book unless you have never read anything about the Internet, web sites, and light software project management.

Rating:
Summary: Couldn't really reccomend
Review: This books promised a lot but didn't really deliver.

It tried to cover too many topics broadly and I think that this detracted from the books overall value.

Also, the book seemed to focus on old-style web sites where each page is stored as an individual file, rather than sites that are dynamically generated eg ASP, JSP etc.