Written by Marco Conti Sunday, 09 November 2008 17:48
This is one of the best generic books on Joomla 1.5 you can buy. The author manages to bring the reader to a very good understanding of Joomla with a minimum of technical terms and the content is always accessible and easy to understand. Read More...
Since it covers only the latest Joomla 1.5 system, it is no help to those that operate an older version of Joomla. For those folks, another book is better suited: "Beginning Joomla!: From Novice to Professional" another book by the same publisher that was written a bit earlier and covers both versions fairly well but with an emphasis on Joomla 1.5.
Building Websites with Joomla! 1.5 is a good introductory book to Joomla .5 and to the open source movement in general. In fact, if the book has any faults they reside to the amount of space dedicated to the Open Source philosophy.
However, beside that quite large detour into OS, the book presents the installation, functioning and administration of a Joomla 1.5 website very clearly and with an eye on the less experienced user that is interested in learning more about dynamic websites.
I would suggest this book to anyone that either has or plan to own a Joomla 1.5 website, to web designers that want to take the plunge into Open Source development and to Joomla developers that need a reference book to read when needed.