Strong-Ties
– “Heavy-duty erector sets”
Archives for November 2004
Christian Exodus
Apparently some on the extreme right have decided that the “U.S. Constitution has been abandoned under our current federal system”, and thus it is time to ” re-introduce the Christian principles once so predominant in America to a sovereign State like South Carolina”. The full posting is located at: Christian Exodus :: Come Out of Her, My People (note, that is their page title, I didn’t make it up – look at the top of your browser window while visiting the site to verify this). Another interesting quote from the page:
> ChristianExodus.org is orchestrating the move of thousands of Christians to reacquire our Constitutional rights and, if necessary to attain these rights, dissolve our State’s bond with the union. Click on our Plan of Action page to find out how we can experience God-honoring governance once again.
So, if I read this correctly, the fact that the right had larger turnout in the last election than they have experienced in decades, thus re-electing an Evangelical Christian to the Presidency, and solidifying a conservative Republican hold on the Legislative branch wasn’t enough. So, they are threatening to take over a state and quite possibly secede from the Union. Boy, that’s a novel concept. I’m sure it will have just as much success as the last time South Carolina seceded from the rest of the country.
This is why I don’t like extremists (no matter which way they lean) – they think up ideas, that, while they are amusing, ultimately make me shudder at their utter lack of awareness and understanding of the world.
Dynamic HTML
A great companion to the HTML Stylesheet Sourcebook, Dynamic HTML from O’Reilly fills in a lot of the gaps, especially in the areas of the DOM and JavaScript. This book is ideal for developers who are already comfortable with HTML and style sheets. I would not recommend it as the main learning resource for someone new to development, as it serves more as a reference book than a tutorial. But that is fine, we all need dictionaries right? Right.
HTML Stylesheet Sourcebook
This is one of the oldest books on my development bookshelf that is still useful. I picked up the HTML Stylesheet Sourcebook in 1997 with the intent of learning the new fangled concept of Cascading Style Sheets and DHTML. While the subject was a bit overwhelming at first (there were a lot of differences between the implementation of CSS within Netscape 4 and IE 4), I was able to ramp up on the technology in short order, due in large part to all of the work Mr. Graham put into this book.
As I said at the top of this post, the HTML Stylesheet Sourcebook is still useful. While a lot of Web sites provide this information, and many other books (including some in my library) cover the same topic, I find myself returning to this one when I need a quick answer.
My Development Bookshelf
I have added a new section to the Web Development category titled Bookshelf, which is to hold reviews of the various books that I use in my day-to-day Web development and design projects. Hopefully my thoughts on the books will prove useful to others as they look for the right book(s) for a specific project, or to learn a particular technology. While I will do my best to provide some detail with each review, I must admit that I have a few books that sit on the shelf unread. For the most part, these unread volumes are review copies, often covering technologies that I just haven’t had the time to pick up. Such is life. I will update these sparse entries when I have had a chance to use the books.
I would also love to hear any recommendations for alternate, or companion books on the subjects covered by each. So, please post a comment, or send me your suggestions!