A few days ago, Chris Coyier and Jeff Starr released their awaited WordPress book named Digging into WordPress and I was lucky enought to get my hands on a copy generously given by the authors.
So, what’s inside? After reading the whole 400 pages of the book I just wrote a review to help you getting a better opinion on the book and see how it can help you to enhance your WordPress skills.
Introducing the book
Some time ago, a new WordPress-focused blog came to life. It wasn’t one of these blogs which only plagiarize content from other WP-related blogs. No, it was a quality blog which shown new technics and provided an useful content to the readers.This blog is called Dig into WordPress. I wasn’t surprised to see that Jeff Starr and Chris Coyier were behind this new project. For those who don’t know yet, both of them are established bloggers which have achieved blogging success with their own sites, so it was really exiting to see this “blogging dream team” coming to life.
Some weeks after I realeased my own WordPress book (called WordPress CookBook, more info here) I saw that the Dig WP team was planning to release a book, and it grabbed my attention : Excepted the “Success with WordPress” ebook by Kyle Eslick, I never really liked any of the WordPress related books I have read.
Being a die-hard WordPress lover, I have done many research about it and I was tired of the amount of books which were boring to read, and which didn’t made me learnt anything new.
A few days after the book release, I was very happy to receive Digging into WordPress for free in my mail box, as a present from the authors. After sending them warm thanks, I copied the book on my laptop so I can read it in the train to Paris.
And man, I loved it.
So, what are you going to learn?
The less I can say is that Digging into WordPress is a very well choosen name for this book. Unlike most books about WordPress, Digging into WordPress will not help you to set up a basic WordPress install with a plugin and a bad looking theme.
Instead, this book focuses on what’s inside WordPress and all the details that will make your blog better, more secure and more powerful.
But does that mean that this book isn’t for beginners? Well, if you’re a total newbie who never installed WordPress it is not the best book to start with. But if you’re a motivated beginner or if you have already some experience with PHP and/or CMS, you’ll definitely enjoy this book.
Now, let’s have a look into what you’re going to learn in Digging into WordPress.
The book is divided in 8 chapters :
- Chapter 1 : Welcome to WordPress
- Chapter 2 : Setting Up WordPress
- Chapter 3 : Anatomy of a WordPress Theme
- Chapter 4 : Theme Design and Development
- Chapter 5 : Extending Functionality
- Chapter 6 : Working with RSS Feeds
- Chapter 7 : Working with comments
- Chapter 8 : Search Engine Optimization
- Chapter 8 : Maintaining a Healthy Site
Another important thing to note is that as you can see on the screenshots featured in this post, the book layout is extremely well designed, which make it very pleasant to read. Seing a technology book with nice fonts and typography is quite rare, so it was a really good surprise.
My personal advice on the book
Being often called an expert myself when it comes to WordPress, I can say that the work done by Chris and Jeff is truely amazing. I have learnt new things, remembered some I forgot, and most notably, I had a real great time reading this awesome work, which show the author definitive passion for WordPress.
A wonderful book that any serious web developer should have in his collection.
Digging into WordPress, by Chris Coyier & Jeff Starr – 400 pages. Buy it ($27)
{ 7 trackbacks }
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
Just ordered it. I haven’t started reading it yet, but it looks definitely cool. And 400 pages for $27 is very cheap!
Actually i am more of a fan of google search for free information. On the other hand, I also belive that you can’t get everything for free
As i am constantly using WP for my blog, i wanted a book that would help me to improve my knowledge about WordPress. This one seems to be the right one. Thank you for sharing. And i think you convinced me to buy it as well 
I am very excited to read this, but I’m disappointed that it is only available in PDF format for the time being.
@Pedro : Indeed the book is very cheap. I’m sure you’ll love it.
@InternetHow Blog : have you grabbed the demo of the book they offer for free on the site? Maybe it will help you to decide to buy iy or not. Oh and btw, please don’t use a keyword as your name.
@Matt : A printed version is scheduled, but sadly I don’t know more about it. If Jeff or Chris see this, maybe they can give you some extra info?
We’re hoping to have the print version out around the time of the new year. If you buy the PDF now, you’ll get a fair discount on the print copy, so you won’t be wasting money buying now =)
Thanks again for the review Jean!
@Matt I was disappointed at first that I could not order a print version of the book the day it was released. It took the wind out of my sails. However, since then I have kind of been deciding, that I might actually enjoy the pdf more, as the links are all live, and the page layout is actually very nice to read as a pdf. Part of what sold me is the free trial. Go check it out and see if you don’t think it’s really nice to read, too.
Sorry I didn’t know you had that policy. You can change it to the one I used here then.
@Ali Papila : No problem, don’t worry
Already bought the book and loving it!
One thing that’s fantastic is the updates that we, buyers, receive!
Money well spent indeed!
Am already using the ‘Digging into WP’ book for a few things, and have only got round to the first 150 pages or so yet.
Have also used the WP Cookbook by Jean-Baptiste to implement quite a few bits and pieces. Heartily endorse both and massive thanks to the creators. Yes you can Google for some (and only some) of this stuff – but having it gathered together in a reference saves you time, hair-pulling wrong-coding-goose-chases and ultimately money.
I am not affiliated with anyone, I do love these books though
so cheers
@Luke : Thanks a lot for buying my book
What book from theese 2 you would sugest to start with?
@Dan : If you’re a beginner with WP, the Success with WordPress ebook by Kyle Eslick can be a good pick.
Otherwise, my book is full of code snippets like those you find on and Digging into WordPress is a really complete resource.
great to see another site, one that knows much about WP, review this book!
sadly, i’ve yet to order myself a copy:( due to crappy times & money situation in the life i’ve got. looking forward to getting both the pdf/book in the near future though, was waiting for this to come out:)
- MexiChriS