Fundamentals of Web Development 1st Edition

Got it cheap for class and came with the access code

Buyer beware! I am new to digitally buying text books and this was my first one. The content of the book is actually very good, and I'm only on chapter 2. However, it being a textbook my professor is assigning work from the labs in the book. This book had a statement in the description that I missed: This is the eBook of the printed book and may not include any media, website access codes, or print supplements that may come packaged with the bound book. As good as this book may be, I need to get an access code to get through the class. Live and learn

very good book for starters

I didn't really have much of a need for this book in my Application Design class, but it did have quite a few helpful points. This is one of those books you want to hang on to even after graduation.

good

I was one of the tech reviewers for this book and I work as an instructional assistant with both authors at Mount Royal University, supporting the kinds of students this book was written for.This book covers a *lot* of ground – too bad you can’t see a chapter listing for this text on Amazon. :(I won't list out all 21 chapters, but will say topics like html/css, php, javascript, xml, security, cms, web services, web server admin, seo, and social network integration get a chapter (or more).I found this book visually easy to follow, which is great if you’re a visual learner (like I am). There are lots (and lots!) of diagrams, the majority being very helpful in explaining concepts (instead of being just eye-candy-content-padding-filler). The layout is appealing, with enough white space and color highlighting to avoid the oh-look-a-wall-of-text effect.As the book description blurb says here on Amazon, it "is appropriate for students who have taken a CS1 course sequence", so if you're totally new to programming, things are going to get confusing once the later chapters start tossing php and javascript code your way. (This isn't surprising, given this is meant to be a textbook for students past their first semester.)I actually think it's a bit of a shame this is being plugged only as a textbook, as I honestly believe that anyone with some developing experience who is interested in getting into webdev would be well-served by this book - I personally learned many things reviewing the book. (The css sections on the box model and the cascade - two topics which I've seen many students struggle with over 10 years of helping them here at MRU - are particularly well done.)Each chapter ends with the usual textbook content (a.k.a. exam fodder): terms and review questions. All chapters - except the first one on how the web works - also have projects of varying difficulty to practice the concepts covered in the chapter. I really liked these projects, as I found them very hands-on and sufficiently meaty, particularly ones past the first few introductory chapters. I can see students hitting a real-world problem after graduating, or during summer employment, and going back to these projects later for reference.

This book was required for my web development course. The end of book projects are poorly constructed and there are no full instructions on how to do the work. One of the chapters actually has a sentence along the lines as "even though we do not believe this is the best practice this is how we will have you do this part." That doesn't make any sense. Why teach something that isn't practical?In terms of demonstrating small things and chapter terms this book was good. However, I wish hadn't had to spend the money on this book.

This book is very well detailed book. A great book for the beginner as well as someone who is looking to gain in depth knowledge in the field of Web Development. I highly recommend this book.Though one problem that I am having is that the e-book didn’t include the access code. An access code is required to access the contents such as Labs, Data files, etc.I am making a humble request to Mr. Radny if he could send me an access code so that I can continue doing the assignments for this class.