Year of the web book (2006)
Tuesday, January 23rd, 2007Well Christmas has long since passed and so has the opportunity for a proper yearly review of 2006 (well, it is nearly February after all!).
The start of the year has been pretty busy so far and in a way it’s felt like I’ve still been finishing off 2006 with the recent official launch of a new site I’ve been working on since well before Christmas.
2006 was definitely the year of the web design/developers book for me in which I read all of the following:
- DOM Scripting - Jeremy keith
- Bulletproof Web Design - Dan Cederholm
- CSS Mastery - Andy Budd
- HTML Mastery - Paul Haine (just finished this, so it just sneaks in!)
- Head Rush Ajax - Brett McLaughlin
- Designing with Web Standards (Second Edition) - Jeffrey Zeldman
These books have really helped me in my understanding of building websites the right way using web standards with accessibility in mind and I feel like I’ve been on a massive learning curve up until now.
After spending so much time last year learning about the technical side of my job I think if I was going to have one resolution for 2007 it would be to actually focus on being a better designer this year, concentrating on really developing and applying graphic design principles into my work.
I now really want to focus on producing some great designs where web standards and good practice are embedded in my work while I also really want to make time to re-design this site.
For anyone else thinking they want to develop their graphic design skills I can definitely recommend the one book I will no doubt be reading this year, the upcoming Five Simple Steps: Designing for the web by Mark Boulton.