Todd Biske: Outside the Box

Packt Publishing sent me a complimentary copy of “Building Website with Joomla! 1.5” by Hagen Graf to review. I specifically was interested in this book as I was researching the use of Joomla! as part of redoing an elementary school website.

First off, the book was well organized. It begins with an introduction to web content management systems and the role they play today in web sites, covers a brief history of Joomla!, and then focuses the rest of the book on the installation and configuration options. As a first time Joomla! user, I can definitely say that the book helped me out quite a bit in understanding the way things were configured. Chapters 4 through 12 focus on different areas of Joomla!, including menus, extensions, components, and content in sufficient detail to make a useful reference but in a way that a first time user can get through the configuration. As a reference, this is the book’s strong point.

Where I was a bit disappointed was that I was look more for a tutorial, rather than a pure reference book. Given that I was setting up a new site using Joomla! for the first time, I was hoping for an extended step by step approach that would take me through a complete site development. While there is a chapter in the book called “A Website with Joomla!,” it was only 12 pages long and was presented more in the context of a demonstration than a tutorial.

Overall, I was pleased with the book. I think it will be a useful reference as I develop the site, but I also think I’ve still got more work ahead of me to get the site out the door.