This well written volume for teachers and other educators rates an "A". Roerden never condescends to her readers, but she does take care to avoid assumptions about her audience's level of Web knowledge. Thus, whether instructors are relative newcomers to the Internet or surfing pros, the projects featured in "Net Lessons" will be easy to follow.
More and more schools are connected to the Web, but the benefits for educators aren't always immediately clear. Roerden's curriculum guide bridges that gap and makes the power and payoff of the Web available to all teachers, whether they instruct kindergartners or high school seniors. The projects similarly encompass all subjects, from Language Arts to Mathematics to Social Studies, and more.
For example, the social studies and science-based "ExTerminator Mystery Project", which can be used for grade levels K-12, teaches students to think critically as they solve the mystery of the evil ExTerminator. They'll also learn about insects and discover scientific and geographical resources available on the Internet.
The appendices offer a lesson plan index, worksheets, and top sites divided by subject area. A CD-ROM is included.
Now here's an unusual book - it doesn't make the typical promise to teach you everything about Java, or HTML, or Moonwalking in 24 jam-packed days. Instead, the book delivers what the title promises: one quick-and-easy Web page brightener for you to try out each day.
The tips are organized into topics, which range from graphics, frames, and multimedia to promoting your site, "the ISP and you", and special characters. If you aren't inspired by the notion of reading one tip every day throughout the year (for example, I don't think I'd wake up on my birthday and bounce on over to the book to memorize Tip 291!), the thorough index will let you find what you need. You don't need to be a programmer, but you can get some easy to use JavaScript routines to jazz up your Web pages.
The tips include both standard browsers (Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer), as well as text-based browsers such as Lynx. There's also info on newsgroups and FAQs, and such clever tricks as tracking site visitors with a counter.
Books on Web design seem to be breeding like bunnies - how else to explain the overabundance of such guides? To stand out, a Web design book needs to cover layout, typography, user interface, and graphic design issues thoroughly; it needs to be well written, and, of course, practice what it preaches by featuring outstanding examples on its pages.
This book comes pretty close to matching the criteria. The guide is divided into seven days worth of lessons, so if you have a desire to immerse yourself in Web designology for a solid week, you're in luck. You'll learn the basics, such as text arrangement and page proportions, then move onto storyboards, frames, and tables. Day Four delves into color, background image, and customized bullets. You'll spend Days Five through Seven learning about filters, animation, navigation, style sheets, audio, and video.
If you don't want to cram like crazy for seven days, you can still use this book as a resource guide. It has an unusually detailed table of contents, so if there's a special topic you're seeking (how about "Download versus Streamed Files," for example), you can find it quickly and easily. The one quibble that might be made is that the authors use the concept of "Good Design" (complete with a green stoplight icon) versus "Bad Design" (yup, it's marked with a red stoplight icon) examples to illustrate their points. However, they use the "Good Design" icon intermittently, and it's never clear if the unlabeled Web pages that are sprinkled throughout the book to demonstrate special features (e.g., NBC's site is included to illustrate the colored margin effect, via an invisible table) are supposed to be mediocre or so outstandingly "good" that it should be obvious even to the most unartistic reader.
The CD-ROM includes the source code, Web page examples, and tools such as HomeSite (for Windows) and BBEdit (for the Mac).
Okay, come on, now, tell the truth: breathes there a human so pure that ne'er a dream has been dreamt about the life of a millionaire? Given your options, in other words, would you really choose dwelling in a tent, eating at McDonald's and shopping at Kmart, to residing in a mansion fully staffed by a cook, butler, and housekeeper, dining at LeDome, and buying whatever takes your fancy at Neiman Marcus?
If you like the tent scenario, stop here. But if chez McDonald's isn't your idea of the ideal feast, pass Go and collect a wealth of ideas from Investor's Web Guide: Tools and Strategies for Building Your Portfolio. Author Gerlach began his career in online investing via CompuServe's National Association of Investors Corporation (NAIC) forum and, later, the Pioneer OnLine Investment Club. He later helped to form an investment club, the Blue Chip Posse, which has enjoyed "above average returns compared to the market."
The fact that Gerlach is describing what he learned on his own (as opposed to within the sacrosanct ivory walls of an Eastern university) makes this guide accessible to even the most novice investors. The investment-related sites featured in his book vary from tutorials for beginners to online investment clubs to financial news, advice, professional and individual organizations, and more. There's a treasure chest of investment goodies out there and, thanks to Gerlach, you don't have to go digging for those riches either. He also provides pithy tips on both investing and using the Web (e.g., there's info on downloading the Acrobat reader to use with online prospectuses from mutual fund companies).