"Neil Gould" wrote in message
M wrote:
I need to find a good self study guide to HTML. As part of my
job I now have to maintain the companies many intranet sites
using Microsoft Visual web Developer 2008 Express Edition. This
has so far amounted to only very minor changes but I will be expected
to do more in the future. This will involve both editing code directly
and using the IDE.
A suitable book would be a complete course almost like a
correspondence course (without the correspondence), between
500 and 1000 pages, include exercises and assume the reader is a
complete novice. A definite "if you can't learn it from this give up"
type of book.
[snip]
So, my best advice at this point is for you to determine as much as
you can about the scope of your job with regard to the existing
intranet's structure, and to expect to need more than one book to
manage and expand it. Beyond that, without knowing your
background, learning style or preferences, I can't recommend
anything specific.
I tend to learn things mostly by trial and error, and my first HTML efforts
(in 1996) were done by modifying existing simple web pages that were similar
to what I needed. Then I found some simple references on-line which mostly
described some common tags, and then a few years later I bought some books,
but they were already almost obsolete. Now I have a large stack of "old"
books, and sometimes I just scan the newer ones from the beginning to
refresh my knowledge and fill in some gaps. As with many skills, I use HTML,
JavaScript, and CGI only occasionally, and I usually find it is better to
search on-line for specific help. I've also learned that there is a lot of
wrong or obsolete material in books as well as on-line.
It is helpful to have a printed reference for basic information such as
tags, but I have found that it is difficult to follow step-by-step
construction of a website from a book, and often the website is different
than what I need so I am forced to learn things that are not applicable to
my interests and I abandon the process and just start building what I want
and trying different things.
For some concepts, I have found short tutorial movies to be quite helpful,
as they tend to hold my interest better than printed material (especially if
the movie is well done). Also, interactive on-line tutorials are very
useful, especially those that allow editing and validation without having to
bounce around between an editor and the validator and the final presentation
in the browser.
I have used various WYSIWYG HTML editors, and SaveAs HTML options, with a
wide range of results. More often than not, I edit the resulting HTML to
format it for better human-readability, and sometimes to fix actual errors
or to do things not available otherwise. I have also tried several CMSs, and
many of them seem (to me) difficult to use and too restrictive. I maintain
one website which uses GoogleSites, and it is useful for other (non-techie)
members to add and modify content, but I find it frustrating and it does not
provide full HTML editing capability or direct FTP access to upload files.
If the objective is to provide comprehensive HTML and general website
training, especially for "dummies", you have to start at an extreme basic
level, and even then there are differences in peoples' comprehension of
various concepts of the workings of computers, files, software, networks,
servers, scripts, editors, email, databases, graphics, browsers, bandwidth,
and security. And there are also the important considerations of content,
aesthetics, ergonomics, and accessibility. If this course is specific to a
certain intranet website, it will need to be tailored to that as well as
individual skill level.
HTH,
Paul
