Just gave my review of Drupal 7 Theming Cookbook.
This is the version I read:
http://www.packtpub.com/drupal-7-theming-cookbook/book
Might find it useful if you're a Drupaler
Covering topics on an opensource project such as Drupal is a challenge because there are so many shifts in various spaces. Another challenge it trying to create a reference that serves as a valuable resource - why purchase a book when there's so much documentation online? Theming is it's own beast. Every developer doesn't like to theme. Every themer doesn't like to develop. They are two roles but for the most part are done by the same person for small efforts and are based on somewhat customized themes - this is why Drupal often suffers in comparison to Joomla/Wordpress - there's not a whole lot of customer for puchase "cool" looking themes so non-experts end up hacking a theme together. So for Drupal, theming is important if it wants to get greater adoption.
Here's where the real challenge lies. Drupal themers typically have their favorite base themes - and each person finds faults or preferences with their own. The Drupal 7 Theming Cookbook uses Zen as a base for theme development. This is a decent choice as it is very popular and a very common choice. That said, there is no mention of Omega or Responsive Theming which is a huge oversight in todays world of phones/tablets and it ignores a lot of themers and Drupal developers that have jumped on that bandwagon. Responsive themes (adjust to the user platform automatically) were are popular, are very cool, was the latest greatest... but I'm hearing that people are learning lessons that somewhat remove the lustre of the newness of responsive themes. It DEFINITELY needs to be included in future versions, however. No guide/intro/cookbook on theming can continue to ignore the power of responsive theming.
Overall the book is focused on fundamentals of theming. It does, in my opinion, a good job in touching on most of the major elements in a way that a beginner should understand and talks about some of the issues that are often overlooked in theming guides - how do you test, how do you manage your source, etc. Some strange decisions on platform might irk some (but whichever platform is chosen will cause issues Windows/Linux/Mac - who's to say who's right?).
I think it's a worthwhile read and reference to get a feel for theming and get the realization that it's not totally straight forward. While the book starts at a beginner basic level it does quite swiftly move to more advanced topics - it would be a push to say that you would be interested in ALL sections but nothing is so long or complicated that it would hurt you to go through and review and I would recommend that you read or glance through all of the sections.
As I said, it's always a challenge to write this kind of book - did the author choose the right platform, the right theme choice, the right type of examples? Is it more worthwhile than the online documentation?
I think it is. It's a nice summary and a good reference. The constant "But there's more.." starts to get tiring and ridiculous after a while - kind of like those late night ads - but it's a cookbook, it's not intended as a sit down read so that's a forgivable sin I would recommend it for a review and quick reference. Eventually you will need to go to your choice of theme's personal help and documentation but if you want to get started this book will show you how and I think mentions a lot of things. Even if the book doesn't cover in great detail - it's those mentions that will build up and at least make you think about things like caching and exporting etc.
Responsive Theming Needs to be added.
This is the version I read:
http://www.packtpub.com/drupal-7-theming-cookbook/book
Might find it useful if you're a Drupaler
Covering topics on an opensource project such as Drupal is a challenge because there are so many shifts in various spaces. Another challenge it trying to create a reference that serves as a valuable resource - why purchase a book when there's so much documentation online? Theming is it's own beast. Every developer doesn't like to theme. Every themer doesn't like to develop. They are two roles but for the most part are done by the same person for small efforts and are based on somewhat customized themes - this is why Drupal often suffers in comparison to Joomla/Wordpress - there's not a whole lot of customer for puchase "cool" looking themes so non-experts end up hacking a theme together. So for Drupal, theming is important if it wants to get greater adoption.
Here's where the real challenge lies. Drupal themers typically have their favorite base themes - and each person finds faults or preferences with their own. The Drupal 7 Theming Cookbook uses Zen as a base for theme development. This is a decent choice as it is very popular and a very common choice. That said, there is no mention of Omega or Responsive Theming which is a huge oversight in todays world of phones/tablets and it ignores a lot of themers and Drupal developers that have jumped on that bandwagon. Responsive themes (adjust to the user platform automatically) were are popular, are very cool, was the latest greatest... but I'm hearing that people are learning lessons that somewhat remove the lustre of the newness of responsive themes. It DEFINITELY needs to be included in future versions, however. No guide/intro/cookbook on theming can continue to ignore the power of responsive theming.
Overall the book is focused on fundamentals of theming. It does, in my opinion, a good job in touching on most of the major elements in a way that a beginner should understand and talks about some of the issues that are often overlooked in theming guides - how do you test, how do you manage your source, etc. Some strange decisions on platform might irk some (but whichever platform is chosen will cause issues Windows/Linux/Mac - who's to say who's right?).
I think it's a worthwhile read and reference to get a feel for theming and get the realization that it's not totally straight forward. While the book starts at a beginner basic level it does quite swiftly move to more advanced topics - it would be a push to say that you would be interested in ALL sections but nothing is so long or complicated that it would hurt you to go through and review and I would recommend that you read or glance through all of the sections.
As I said, it's always a challenge to write this kind of book - did the author choose the right platform, the right theme choice, the right type of examples? Is it more worthwhile than the online documentation?
I think it is. It's a nice summary and a good reference. The constant "But there's more.." starts to get tiring and ridiculous after a while - kind of like those late night ads - but it's a cookbook, it's not intended as a sit down read so that's a forgivable sin
I would recommend it for a review and quick reference. Eventually you will need to go to your choice of theme's personal help and documentation but if you want to get started this book will show you how and I think mentions a lot of things. Even if the book doesn't cover in great detail - it's those mentions that will build up and at least make you think about things like caching and exporting etc.Responsive Theming Needs to be added.
