Book Review + Giveaway Of Digging into WordPress (2 copies)
Saad BassiThis article is the first post of our new “Book Review Series” in which we will try to review and giveaway a book each week here on 1stWD for our awesome readers. If you are a WordPress lover like me then I am sure you have also read some books regarding WordPress. There are a plenty of books available in WordPress niche but one of the most comprehensive book I have ever seen is Digging into WordPress by Chris Coyier and Jeff Starr. Both of them are renowned authors and famous developers of WordPress Community. Today we will review the book and yes as said in title, we have 2 copies of Digging into WordPress to giveaway for our beloved 1stWD readers.
About the Authors
The book is co-authored by Chris Coyier of CSS-Tricks and Jeff Starr of Perishable Press. Both of them are famous in WordPress Community because of their out of the box solutions for developing websites using WordPress.
I will suggest you to check their blogs to guess the quality of content in book. The blogs mentioned before are filled completely with awesomeness.
What’s so Special in Book??
So you want to know what’s so special in this book. The authors of book wrote it in just two lines and we think that it is 100% Correct.
There is much to learn about the World’s most popular publishing platform. From your first steps of learning about WordPress all the way through maintaining a site throughout the years, this book is packed with truly practical information.
In short, the book will teach you how to create a WordPress theme from scratch. Starting from how to install WordPress securely, you will end the book learning clever tips and tricks for advanced WordPress theme development.
Why we liked the book?
There is no doubt that the whole book is filled with great content but the best thing we liked in the book is written below.
The PDF version of the book is awesome because we will be able to update and expand it indefinitely. As WordPress changes, the book will evolve with new information, techniques, and code. This is why we call the DiW PDF a “living, breathing document” – it will grow with WordPress, and will be updated and improved periodically well into the future.
Yes, you have got it right. The plan is to update this book as often as WordPress changes with new versions. When we first heard about this feature, we thought that It will be a little bit difficult as WordPress releases 3 Major versions in a single year. It’s not easy to update the book thrice a year, but the guys behind Digging into WordPress proved their selves by providing the version two just after 3 months of releasing the book to public. This means that the book will get an update after WordPress 3.0 so you will never feel that your techniques are old.
Two new chapters in DiW V2
It’s here, THE GIVEAWAY
We have 2 copies of DiW book for giveaway. We are thankful to the guys behind DIW for supporting this giveaway. Read on how to take part in giveaway.
How to enter in the giveaway?
Pretty simple, you have to leave a comment on the post and tell us what you want to see on 1stwebdesigner, or how we can make the website better. The comments should be constructive and powerful so that you can increase the chance of your win. We will select the best opinions and winners will be announced. The giveaway is open till 11:59pm GMT+5, May 11th 2010.
Grab the book right now
If you don’t like waiting for the result of giveaway, you can buy the book here directly. What we can assure you that this book is definitely worth your money.
Feel free to let me know if you want us to review some specific book via comments section. Good Luck!
For Further Reading:
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jeremy
Posted 260 days ago 53Very interested in these books – hoping for a chance
Katie
Posted 630 days ago 51I don’t know why everyone has a problem with the lists, they’re the main reason I visit. I like to find beautiful and inspiring sites, but I rarely find time to go look for them myself. So thanks 1st Webdesigner!
.-= Katie´s last blog ..BBC Radio Interview on The Simpsons’ 20th Birthday =-.
Dainis Graveris
Posted 629 days ago 52Thanks for support – of course there a lot of bad type of list posts just plainly listing stuff, but we try to keep easy to scan article in the same time thinking about interesting and unique content.
Edwin van der Veer
Posted 643 days ago 50Thanks for the great article on ‘Digging into WordPress’.
About your site then…;)
I know you have to generate revenue, but there’s a little too much advertising to my liking. Otherwise, the article section is crisp and clear :)
Right now I am swaying between different CMS’es. I have tried Joomla, Drupal, Modx, Concrete5, to name but a few. Recently I dove into WordPress, because it has a lot flexibility and with the upcoming release of WordPress 3.0, that should become even better. (read the excellent article on Mashable)
I like the extensive collection of themes that sites like Themeforest and the likes deliver. Recently I tried the Twitter module of XHanch on another host than WordPress.com and liked it a lot ! The modules collection is nothing short of amazing and the fact that package dependencies are solved automatically, is a bonus as well. No more fiddling with core packages and such… ;) WordPress will probably become my CMS of choice, because of the reasons mentioned above. But to harness that power, I really would like to have a good manual to help me on my way. So there you have it….in a nutshell. Reading an excerpt of Digging into WordPress, I think that it will help me a lot.
Kind regards,
Edwin
Roy Vergara
Posted 643 days ago 49I’d like to see more UI/UX related articles. Thanks for the contest!
.-= Roy Vergara´s last blog ..20 Stellar Websites with Robots =-.
Russell Crawford
Posted 643 days ago 48Well i think the site is great but the design seems a little bland and boring, i think it would be a lot nicer with a bokeh style colourful background instead of the blue gradient.
Jayson
Posted 643 days ago 47I would LOVE to see some articles on Thesis. I have been designing with it a lot lately and it would be very helpful.
clive bearman
Posted 644 days ago 46I’d love to see articles on website graphical design.
Thanks
Rachel
Posted 644 days ago 45This is such a great giveaway, and I’ve been after this book for ages so it’d be great to win it!
With regards to 1st Web Designer, I’d prefer to see more in depth articles. Articles like the recent “5 Ideas to Help You Become a Better Designer” and “Be a Design Commando” are much better than the generic list articles that are mostly seen around design blogs these days. Having said that, sometimes lists are popular and sometimes they’re useful, but the in depth articles just seem to have more substance and make the blog seem more reputable and well thought out.
lawrence77
Posted 645 days ago 44I want to win :)
I want to see more tutorials than roundups :D
THanks for the giveaway ;)
Michael
Posted 645 days ago 43I would like to see more WordPress tips and reviews.
KyRoka
Posted 646 days ago 42I would like to see more on exercises for keeping your skill up to date.
Bitoo
Posted 646 days ago 41Keep up the good work.
More tutorials featuring conversion from Photoshop to HTML, Fireworks to HTML etc.
Good Luck All.
Lorena
Posted 225 days ago 54You got to push itthis eessnital info that is!
Stefano Petroni
Posted 647 days ago 40Hi from italy!
Just to say I read your site and thank you for many precious tips and info I find here.
Good Job.
sriganesh
Posted 647 days ago 39thanks for the giveaway !
I like to see more tutorials on vector and character design ! hidden powerful tips from both Photoshop and illustrator.
articles about boosting creativity and Industrial ethics ( learning and working strategic is different) it will really help new fresh designers !!
================
this book helps me in making my WordPress blog more user friendly to readers and know the knowledge about them.
.-= sriganesh´s last blog ..Freebie: Illustrator Floral Symbols #1 =-.
Douglas d'Aquino
Posted 647 days ago 38OMG, it will be hard to win with so much good opinions about the site, but I’ll try anyway.
I think you can improve a lot 1stwebdesigner’s site by making it bigger. I mean, literally. Your major public is formed by designers and I bet that everyone has a good screen resolution (those who doesn’t, should). It’s kind of boring have to roll the screen down too often. Well, you can do that by making the sidebar smaller, or increasing the size of the entire site.
The tutorials are great, I’m learning great things about Photoshop (since I’m used to work with fireworks), but I’m in need for CS5 tutorials. Many times I feel confused following the tutorials because some tools changed slightly and I can’t find the correct options (I’m a newbie in PS). Anyway, you should also update the current PS CS4 tutorials to CS5 (not changing the whole article, but at least putting some observation like “in CS5, use this tool instead of that tool” or something like that).
In deviantart community, I don’t like the way you post updates. It’s always just a quote from the article. Put at least half of the content there, or a nice introduction that really give a feel of what’s in your site, because a couple paragraphs don’t explain too much and blog posts in DA are meant to be full blog posts, not advertising space.
Well, I hope my opinions are valuable. Even if I don’t win, I expect you to do some of the changes proposed here.
Cheers
Jeremy Wells
Posted 647 days ago 34I really like all of the posts you currently do and find myself wadding through them for hours at times. One cool thing you could do is try to involve readers a little more to create a greater sense of community. This could be done via giving users feedback on their work or showing how they have implemented one of your articles.
Katie
Posted 647 days ago 31Looks like a great book, thanks for the heads up about it.
I really like this site, and actually especially enjoy the lists of different types of websites that you feature. I’ve been collecting webshots for the last 3 years, and whenever I need inspiration I find it an incredibly useful resource. It’s also great to see web trends and how quickly fashions come and go.
I’m always surprised at how plain this site is, but I don’t means that as a criticism. I like that you emphasize functionality over design through your own site.
I would like to see the search feature work better on this site, which would mean better tags on the articles. I would also think that some kind of ranking system for what level of knowledge the article would best suit would be beneficial in the teaser paragraph.
I like that you use a variety of authors, and your posts are frequent enough for me to keep you on my RSS feed, but not so frequent that I get overwhelmed.
The only thing I think that you really need to change is that hideous banner at the top.
.-= Katie´s last blog ..BBC Radio Interview on The Simpsons’ 20th Birthday =-.
Eddie Gear
Posted 647 days ago 30As much as I would love to Win an Awesome copy of the book. I would love to see this site re-designed with a unique look that stands out from the rest of the graphic design blogs. I would also love to see some awesome flash tuts with source files that will help readers like me improve our skills in the area.
Thanks,
Eddie
Quinton Wash
Posted 647 days ago 29I notice in studying tutorials it seems all the same. An expert of some sort gets online and puts together a tutorial of an action or skill set that he or she has been doing for a while. So whether video or text tutorial, they make the tutorial seem like its super easy. Then someone like me gets on there and it just doesn’t come out just right and you don’t know why.
I would like to see some tutorials explain in places where and why there may be some slight differences in results especially if the user will eventually or is using a different photo to complete the tutorial. In knowing why there may be changes and where the user will become empowered and more knowledgeable of designing with the technique used and not just following instructions on a screen.
Tony Dunsworth
Posted 647 days ago 28I would like to see more on tweaking in WP and other CMSs just to see what is available. Or more on building your own frameworks/templates to challenge a programmer’s skills
Jeremy R. Cox
Posted 647 days ago 27It would be great if this blog had various options for sorting the different categories other than just most recent first. For example, you could have an option to sort by most popular, most comments, or most tweeted about.
Marcipa
Posted 647 days ago 26Hi,
I would like to read about makeing themes for wp.
cheers
M