For what it's worth, I think these are all legitimate, good reasons. Especially the point that experienced writers can communicate much better than most other people who don't write (like me.) I understand that it can be an enjoyable experience, and I look forward to seeing the book.
The only thing I wanted to say is often I don't have books with me while I'm doing coding, especially at work. I do use the Internet all the time to lookup Javadoc, find examples, etc. For instance there are Struts books (even from O'Reilly) but because I don't have that book with me at all times I usually do searches to find out the info I need. If there were only books and no online documentation for Hibernate, XDoclet, Ant, and numerous other libraries, I would probably be frustrated and out hundreds of dollars in book fees. :) Books are great for communicating theories and ideas, best practices, strategies, etc. For instance I carry around Effective Java by Joshua Bloch every where I go. I find that book to be one of the best, if not the best, overall Java programming books for advanced Java developers. At one point I did buy Java in a Nutshell but I don't use it because all of the info can be found on the web. > On Wed, 2003-10-01 at 04:46, Roland Berger wrote: > > It is only fair that contributors and commiters can get a > pay back for > > the great work they do in their free time. Is it by > writting a book or > > by providing some consulting work. > > Right, I see writing the book as pleasurable experience. It > will certainly be hard work but I think it will be enjoyable. > And it's certainly for the recognition that I write the book, > I can't speak for Bob. It's not going to be a money making > endeavour and we're not writing it to make money. I also have > enough work to keep me busy 'til the end of time (or longer) > so I doubt I'll be doing much other work as a result of the > book. To me I hope for the book to be a labour of love. > > > When I use open source software I usually buy the book when it is > > written by one of the contributors or commiters. And one of the > > reasons I buy them is to honor the work they have done. > 30U$ really is > > not much. > > And it just supports OSS in general which I personally think > is always good. Which is why I am happy O'Reilly is involved. > They are staunch supporters of OSS and realize what most of > us are like and are adept at working with my kind i.e. very > difficult to work with most likely :-) > > > > You should go over to Prentice Hall, they are very open to > > > publishing free e copies. > > > > If you go over to Manning Publications they usually offer an > > electronic version to a lower price bevor the hard copy is > available. > > Also they submit some of the core chapters for public review to > > www.theserverside.com like they do currently for "JSF in Action" > > > (http://www.theserverside.com/resources/JSFInA> ctionReview.jsp). Since > > it will take a long time to finish the book it would be > great to make > > some chapters available for the public to review bevor it > is finished. > > I'm hoping to at least get some chapters out for viewing but > I don't know what will be possible yet insofar as electronic > pre-releases. I would like to because it will only make the > book better and think it would actually help to sell more hard copies. > > With Thinking in Java I bought the hard copy not only because > it was an excellent primer but I respected the fact that the > author made the book available in electronic form for people > who might not have 40 bucks to spend on a book, or people who > would rather not chew up a tree and for that reason I bought the book. > > > Cheers > > Roland > > > > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > -- > jvz. > > Jason van Zyl > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://tambora.zenplex.org > > In short, man creates for himself a new religion of a > rational and technical order to justify his work and to be > justified in it. > > -- Jacques Ellul, The Technological Society > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
