[TOS] Another few steps along the textbook path

[Clif Kussmaul]

Hi Greg and others,

1. Many coherent chapters with loose coupling is a great idea.
That makes it easier to distribute the writing & editing, 
avoids the need to impose a consistent style/voice, etc.
and makes it easier to adapt the content to different courses.
Another good book with this model is Beautiful Code (Oram & Wilson).

A related idea - should we have peer review of chapters?
That would help give the academics "credit" for the project,
esp. if we can get academic, FOSS, & industry reviewers 
who aren't directly involved in the project, 
rather than just reviewing each others' work.


2. I think we need both types of case studies: 
a. a few chapters that dig into representative projects,
  especially if those projects are referenced often in other chapters.
  Include a range of small, large, and mega-projects.
b. many sidebars that relate other topics to specific projects


Clif

------------------------------
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 2009 05:11:21 -0400 (EDT)
From: Greg DeKoenigsberg <gdk at redhat.com>
Subject: [TOS] Another few steps along the textbook path
To: tos at teachingopensource.org

Hello folks.  After a great few days at the Softhum workshop in Drexel, 
I've made revisions to the textbook outline.  Find them here:

http://teachingopensource.org/index.php/User:Gregdek/Textbook

I've got more revisions to go through, but I move forward a bit at a time. 
The things I'm thinking right now:

1. I think back to one of my favorite computing books ever: Unix Power 
Tools.  One of the reasons it's so great, I think, is because it's written 
by many authors, in relatively small chunks, all of whom share their 
experience, and the style is engaging because of it.  I believe that 
between Chris Tyler, David Humphrey, Clif Kussmaul, Will Cohen, Heidi 
Ellis, Tridge and others, we've got a lot of experience and could do very 
well with that style.  My question: is that an appropriate style for a 
textbook?  If not, why not?

2. Case studies.  Should they be their own chapters, or should they be 
snippets that are connected directly to the material in question?  i.e. do 
we have a separate "moodle" chapter, or do we have an example of "how this 
lesson can be applied to the moodle project"?

As always, patches and comments welcome.  Another week will yield another 
revision.  :)

--g

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