Publishers of technology books, eBooks, and videos for creative people
Home > Topics > Web Design & Development > HTML/XHTML
HTML/XHTML
Articles
In this chapter from Learn to Code HTML and CSS: Develop and Style Websites, Shay Howe discusses the box model and how it works with HTML and CSS, and also looks at a few new CSS properties.
Thomas Michaud walks you step by step through how to create a table in HTML, in this chapter from Foundations of Web Design: Introduction to HTML & CSS.
This chapter from HTML and CSS: Visual QuickStart Guide, 8th Edition explains which HTML semantics are appropriate for different types of text, especially (but not solely) for text within a sentence or phrase.
In addition to native multimedia, one of the most talked about capabilities that HTML5 brings to the web table is the ability to draw and manipulate graphics using JavaScript via the new canvas element. The element defines an area on a web page that you can draw on using a JavaScript API. Ian Devlin shows you how to use it.
Blogs
I'm trying to figure out how exactly iBooks treats an ePub file: which formatting it preserves and which it ignores. The fact that it ignores any at all, is incredibly short-sighted. Nevertheless, given that limitation, it seems like a good idea to at least quantify what we’re dealing with so that those who wish to design a book can have a safe idea of what it might look like, once it’s on the iPad.
Yesterday, I noted that Apple's sample Winnie-the-Pooh eBook had text that wrapped around the image at the beginning of each chapter and that I'd like to know how it did that. According to the OPS spec, CSS position properties (like absolute and fixed) are strongly discouraged. I originally interpreted that as applying to the float property as well, but that does not seem to be the case.
Q: Are there alternatives to Arial, Times, and Georgia for Web designers?
The short answer is YES!
The slightly longer answer is that most designers use Arial, Times, or Georgia, and, to a lesser degree, Verdana, Trebuchet MS, Courier, and Comic Sans because they think that’s all they have at their disposal, but they are wrong.
The long answer is that the core Web fonts (the one listed above plus Impact and Web Dings) are used because they are almost guaranteed to be installed on the vast majority of computers your designs are likely to be installed on. One fact of life in Web design is that unless the end user's computer has access to the font file, then the browser cannot use it.
Q: What is the practical difference between px (pixel) and em (pronounced m)? When is it best to use one over the other?
The short answer is that pixels measure dimensions relative to the screen while ems measure dimensions relative to type size.
The slightly longer answer is that pixels are the natural unit for measuring dimensions on a screen and are often used when precise design is required. Ems are the natural unit for measuring type and used when you want to allow maximum design flexibility.