I recently got the chance to read this new book released by Packtpub on March this year. I would really love to share a few thoughts with you about this book.

Joomla! 1.5 Beginner's Guide takes you to a journey to learn by doing. Through this book you will learn how to build a realistic example website step-by-step. Instead of just learning about Joomla!'s capabilities in general terms, you'll meet real-world web building challenges!

The book is written in an easy language covering almost everything you need to know to build a fully fledged Joomla! powered website. In Twelve chapters you will learn how to install, build, maintain and extend your website.

I've seen some books about Joomla! that never talk about extensions! Or they just mention a few words about the difference between its types. This one is different; there's a chapter talking about the popular extensions and how do you get the most out of the Extensions Directory.

There's a great chapter about templates. Almost the very first question a new Joomla! user ask after installations is "OK, where do we get those good looking designs I've seen!?" The author lists some important references for websites that offer free templates. It also explain the basics of template tweaking and how to change your template with CSS. Don't worry you don't have to be a CSS-Ninja to do that! Some basic knowledge of CSS would be enough. At the end of this chapter the author include a few valuable resources for blogs and tutorials explaining how to create your template from the scratch.

The last chapter is talking about attracting traffic from search engines and explain some SEO techniques that will help spreading your contents. At the end of each chapter the author included a group of question so you can test what you've learned and see if you grasped the important points of you should go back and read again!

If you're really struggling to get your Joomla! website to work or you want to go beyond the look of a typical Joomla! site and make the site meet your specific needs, this book is for you! Download a sample chapter from the book here.