Revision areas to focus on
If you find yourself wondering what areas you should focus on practicing and learning, here are a few fundamental CSS topics:
Selectors, Properties, and Values: CSS uses selectors to target HTML elements and apply specific styles to them. You should be familiar with the various types of selectors (e.g., element, class, ID, attribute, pseudo-class, and pseudo-element selectors) and how to use them to target elements. Additionally, be sure you understand the concept of properties (such as ‘color’, ‘font-size’, ‘margin’, and ‘padding’) and their respective values, which define the styles to be applied to the selected elements.
The Box Model: The CSS box model describes how the layout of elements is calculated in terms of content, padding, border, and margin. You should understand how these four components contribute to an element’s total width and height, as well as how they influence the positioning of elements on a webpage. Be familiar with properties like ‘box-sizing’, ‘border’, ‘padding’, and ‘margin’ that control the box model’s behavior.
Inheritance and Specificity: Inheritance is a key concept in CSS, where some style properties are automatically passed down from parent elements to their children. Understand which properties are inherited and how this can affect your styles. Specificity is a set of rules that determine which styles take precedence when multiple selectors target the same element. You should be familiar with how specificity is calculated and how to use it effectively to avoid conflicts between styles.
CSS Positioning and Layout: CSS provides various methods for positioning and arranging elements on a webpage, such as ‘static’, ‘relative’, ‘absolute’, and ‘fixed’ positioning, as well as the ‘float’ property. You should also be familiar with modern CSS layout techniques, such as Flexbox and CSS Grid, which offer more advanced and flexible ways to create responsive layouts. Understanding these positioning and layout techniques will help you create complex and visually appealing web designs.
Free Sample CSS Practice Test Questions
CSS Problem-solving question
Question: You want to apply different background colors to every other row in a table to improve readability without using JavaScript or adding any extra classes or IDs to the table’s HTML. Which of the following CSS selectors can you use to achieve this?
A) table:nth-row(odd)
B) table:nth-child(odd)
C) tr:nth-of-type(odd)
D) tr:nth-child(even)
Solution: C
Explanation: To apply different background colors to every other row in a table without using JavaScript or adding any extra classes or IDs to the table’s HTML, you can use the CSS selector ‘tr:nth-of-type(odd)’. This selector targets every odd-numbered ‘tr’ (table row) element and allows you to style it accordingly. For example:
tr:nth-of-type(odd) {
background-color: #f2f2f2;
}
CSS terminology knowledge question
Question: Which of the following CSS terminologies refers to a method of grouping and applying multiple style rules to a single selector, reducing repetition and improving code readability?
A) Selector chaining
B) Inheritance
C) Rule merging
D) Declaration grouping
Solution: D
Explanation: Declaration grouping in CSS refers to a method of applying multiple style rules to a single selector. By grouping declarations, developers can reduce repetition and improve code readability. In declaration grouping, multiple declarations are combined within a single pair of curly braces ({}) and separated by semicolons (;).
For example:
h1 {
font-size: 24px;
font-weight: bold;
color: #333;
text-align: center;
}
CSS conceptual knowledge question
Question: Which of the following concepts in CSS allows child elements to inherit specific style properties from their parent elements, creating a predictable and structured flow of styling throughout the HTML document?
A) Specificity
B) The Box Model
C) Inheritance
D) The Cascade
Solution: C
Explanation: Inheritance is a fundamental concept in CSS that allows child elements to inherit specific style properties from their parent elements. This creates a predictable and structured flow of styling throughout the HTML document, ensuring that related elements share the same styles and helping to maintain consistency across the page. Inheritance also simplifies the CSS code and reduces the need for redundant style declarations.
