Cascading Style Sheets
Simplifed! See Castro, Chapters 15-16 for details

Local Syntax:

<TAG STYLE="ATTRIBUTE:VALUE"> xxx </TAG>
--mutiple attribute:value pairs are separated by semicolons

Internal Syntax:

TAG {ATTRIBUTE:VALUE}
--enclose statements in <STYLE> xxx </STYLE> tags in HEAD
--hide STYLE section contents as a comment
--mutiple attribute:value pairs are separated by semicolons
--multiple tags are separated by commas
--parent-child tags are separated by spaces

CSS AttributereplacesTypical value(s)
font-family:FONT FACE=arial,helvetica,sans-serif
font-style:Iitalic
font-weight:Bbold
font-size:FONT SIZE=large or smaller or 12pt or 10px or 125%
line-height:-14pt or 15px or 150%
Font -- single attribute with combined values
font: style weight variant size/height family
text-decoration-none
color:FONT COLOR=brown
background:BGCOLOR=ivory
 BACKGROUND=url(texture.gif)
text-align:ALIGN=right
z-index:-2
display:-none
width:-px or %
height:-px or %
list-style-url(my.gif) -- many options
page-break-before:-always
page-break-after:-always
Box values -- all or x-top x-right x-bottom x-left --
position:absolute-top; right; bottom; left
position:relative-top; right; bottom; left
border:--side weight type color
padding-left:20px
margin:--side em
float:-right
clip: -rect(20 200 90 50)
Some rules of thumb for most/many/some CSS statememts
Size can be expressed as points (pt), pixels (px), ems (em), inches (in), centimenter, or perpercentages (%)
The box contains an object which may be surrounded successively by padding, then a border, then a margin.
Box values can be expressed with one value for the entire box (default).
Alternately, box values can be expressed with two values for the top-bottom and left-right combinations.
Furthermore, box values can be expressed with four values in the order top, right, bottom, left -- or separately by specifying the side
CSS1 and CSS2 standards are not supported identically by all recent version 5/6 browsers
CSS is supported poorly/not at all by older version 3/4 browsers
If the creation and administration of CSS proves too complicated for you, use free software such as TopStyle Light, which is also included in the highly regarded HomeSite HTML editor.