New Book: “On Web Development”

Published on Jul 1, 2015, filed under books, development, maintainability, html, css, design (feed). (Share this on Mastodon or Bluesky?)

I wrote another book. On Web Development. On Web Development is an ebook that collects most of the articles about web development (and web design) that I wrote between 2005 and 2015. Most articles as in most useful, most important, and also most controversial. Ordered, polished, and commented to make up for a few cents markup. If anything on meiert.com helped anyone in the past, everyone buying this ebook helps me with my new projects.

If, in an environment like this, you get your hands on a book some of whose texts are more than a decade old and it still makes you think and nod—well, than it’s probably one of those rare publications on web stuff that get a level above the technical minutiae and try to look at more basic and less volatile questions.

…readers say on Amazon.de.

Description

On Web Development bundles 134 articles and the last 11 years of technical writings by Jens Oliver Meiert (meiert.com). Freshly reordered and commented, the articles cover processes and maintenance, HTML and CSS, standards, as well as development and design in general; they include coding basics and principles, carefully scathing criticism, and tips and tricks and trivia.

→ This is the book if you opt for convenient access to a Google tech lead’s early web development learnings and teachings.

The outline:

• Foreword
• Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• On Web Development
  • Processes
  • Maintenance
  • HTML
  • CSS
  • Standards
  • Development
  • Design
  • This and That
• Afterword
• Feedback
• About the Author

❧ I’ve written On Web Development for three reasons. Most importantly, I’ve wanted to make my writings accessible in a more orderly, more compact fashion. Related, I’ve been also curious whether an article compilation in ebook format would be a useful complement to a seasoned blog (I had observed similar with LaBossiere’s A Philosopher’s Blog). Lastly, I’ve needed some sort of closure (which I hinted at in the book, and may elaborate on later).

Thanks go to a great many people, yet here I’ll emphasize my gratitude to who I call some of the most inspiring people I’ve learned from in my career—Joe Clark, Ian Hickson, Eric Meyer, Jakob Nielsen, Don Norman, Edward Tufte, and Anne van Kesteren—as well as the two who contributed to and helped the most getting On Web Development out of the door—Sarah M. Tyrrell and Tony Ruscoe. Thank you.

(Please have a look!)

About Me

I’m Jens (long: Jens Oliver Meiert), and I’m a web developer, manager, and author. I’ve been working as a technical lead and engineering manager for companies you’ve never heard of and companies you use every day, I’m an occasional contributor to web standards (like HTML, CSS, WCAG), and I write and review books for O’Reilly and Frontend Dogma.

I love trying things, not only in web development and engineering management, but also in other areas like philosophy. Here on meiert.com I share some of my experiences and views. (I value you being critical, interpreting charitably, and giving feedback.)