Welcome to the Safari Jungle

Robby Russell writes "Paper books have a tendency to accumulate dust, take up large amounts of shelf space and be a painful reminder that you need to get rid of stuff when moving time comes and you find yourself packing up the same Pascal book for an eighth time. Granted, the book provides a level of self-accomplishment and it's always great to have your best books out in direct sight of anyone who may come over to your home or office. You know the type; the ones who are observant and notice the books that you want the world to know that you've read, as if you were to say, 'Been there, done that.' You can't tell me that you don't put some of them up intentionally. ;-)" Russell is taken with O'Reilly's floating-rental system called Safari; read on for his review of the system. (various) author (various) pages (various) publisher O'Reilly and other participating publishers rating 9 reviewer Robby Russell ISBN (various) summary Technical book rental is here, and you may find the convenience a compelling enough factor to give up the paper versions of the available titles.

O'Reilly has come up with an interesting solution to your lack of physical shelf space: a virtual bookshelf. Safari Bookshelf is a great resource for all things technical. They recently went over 1,000 titles available online, 24/7. Several publishers have joined forces with O'Reilly to provide so many titles. Que, Alpha, Sams, Microsoft Press (and O'Reilly itself) are a few of the big-name publishers that are part of Safari. Currently, 75% of all O'Reilly books are available through Safari. (With plans for adding 10+ books per month, the selection is growing rapidly, too.)

Safari subscriptions can be had in 10-, 20- or 30-slot varieties, depending on how much you care to read (and spend). Prices end up close to $1.50 per slot each month, with slight discounts if you buy annually rather than by the month. (A $9.99/month 5-slot shelf is available too, if you just want to test the waters.)

Recently, I had the privilege of giving Safari a test-run thanks to the generous offer made to user groups.

The website's navigation was fairly easy to grasp, and I was able to start searching for books as soon as I logged into the system. O'Reilly's made browsing pleasant, by listing the main categories and allowing you to branch down into subcategories to find the book you may or may not be looking for.

I was given a 10-book shelf to start my trial of Safari. This account would typically go at $14.99/month (or $159.99/year). The bookshelf is great. You can add a book to your bookshelf and you keep it there for 30 days, after which you can remove the book and replace it with a different one. So, you can have 10 books in your "shelf" at any given time, and switch no more than 10 books a month under this account level. That is 120 books a year for roughly $1.33/book. That's impressive.

It just so happened that I was currently working on migrating from Sendmail to Postfix recently and wanted to read up more on Postfix to see if there was more I could do to keep my server running happily. I typed in "postfix" in the search, and voila! 109 books were found with that word in the title or description. The search results allowed me to View by Book and/or View by Section (which I found really helpful by showing me a section of the book that contained the word "postfix"). I scanned a few more books in greater depth, looking at the Table of Contents of various books and even looking at the books' chapter previews. A lot of text to look at before I even decide on checking out a book. Being in a bookstore wouldn't have been this good: you can't search through a bookstore for a specific keyword in all texts and get back these kinds of results.

After reviewing a small handful of books, I felt comfortable with my decision and checked out the appropriately-titled book by Sams, "Postfix" by Richard Blum and added it to my bookshelf. The book will be on my bookshelf for the next 30 days. Immediately, I went over to My Bookshelf and found myself looking through the same text you would find in the paper version of this book (but in the font face and size that I set in my browser preferences). It lets me print a page, send the page as an email to someone, etc. I was reading about open relays, and added a bookmark to the page which shows up on the "My Safari" personal page listing all the books I have currently checked out. That page also shows recent searches, newly available books, public notes, etc. With a few clicks, I can go from my computer desktop to page 152 of The Perl Cookbook which is quicker than me looking through my library of paper books and finding my place.

I have since added six more books and visit My Safari page roughly 5+ times throughout my day to read more on various topics. All this content available anytime I need it, and I still have spaces left in my bookshelf. They do offer 5-slot Safari Bookshelf for those who don't need 10 books a month, which is probably where I would fall. The great thing is that this is very affordable. (After calculating the costs of all the books I had bought in the past year, I could have paid for and viewed roughly 232 books plus the 8 technical books I bought last year.)

On the downside, colleagues who come by my home or office won't see my new copy of MySQL Cookbook because it is online rather than on my shelf showing another O'Reilly animal. I might have to print out the covers and tape them to my old school books to deal with that for the time being, but I am sure that Safari Bookshelf is how I plan to spend money on technical documentation from now on.

If it were a Tom Robbins book however, I couldn't see myself sitting in a cozy chair reading it on a laptop; this idea only makes sense to me for technical information because I am sitting at my computer anyways -- and where else would I need technical documentation?

If this idea intrigues you, visit O'Reilly's Safari Bookshelf page. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

Comments

Confusion!

[Nikk Name]

Isn't Safari the name of Apple's new browser? I predict legal clashes if both of these expand in the tech world.

Re:Confusion!

[hughk]

As the reader is a standard browser, you should be able to read Safari with Safari!

What confusion?

Re:Confusion!

[buckminster]

Except this Safari came first. They've been online for well over a year.

finally a viable business plan for ebooks

[gazoombo]

finally a viable business plan for ebooks! this will be soooo handy!

Re:finally a viable business plan for ebooks

[edbarrett]

But they let you print the pages! They let you email pages to PieRats! The Terrorists Have Already Won!TM

Re:finally a viable business plan for ebooks

[SpaceJunkie]

Shhhhh... You werent meant to tell them that...
I spose its a model I would like to see continued though. It would save me paper, although at my office we have now created a departmental library- where books are contributed or aqcuired, and a list of books on peoples desks so we can borrow them when needed. Between the whole department, we have a reasonably high number of useful books, including multiple copies of all the editions of stroustrup and K & R.
With the fact that as long as we book them out we can take them home - it gives a highly specialised library.
I always wandered why no-one had ever set up a physical or internet techie book library- its definately a required resource which I would pay for. Chances are that my department will get a group subscription to this or something if we nag them...

Re:finally a viable business plan for ebooks

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps you should ask your department to accumulate some books on grammar, and a dictionary or two. Then you could read them and learn how to spell and write correctly.

Re:finally a viable business plan for ebooks

[agentv]

> finally a viable business plan for ebooks!

...I'm not certain. I think it's a viable plan for me, as a consumer. But I don't know if it's going to pay for O'Reilly or not. I suppose the benefit of having a recurring revenue stream from me is good for them. But that was true before, as long as they continued to publish vital, relevant, and accurate books.

I do hope this business model works out because I find it to be a wonderful service. I would like to see it offer even more books.

Collecting Books

[Anonymous Coward]

Most men that I know (me included) tend to collect books, or store them until we can get a book shelf to fill them up with. Why do we just collect books?

Perhaps so we have something to do while eating our double batch of tofu? ;)

-Rick

guilty

[Anonymous Coward]

I haven't read 25% of the books on my shelf yet.

Re:guilty

[Erebus]

Me, either, especially the reference books. How many people read a spec cover-to-cover, like a story, anyway?

At least I'll have the books, should I wish to read them later, lend them to a friend or colleague, or sell them for cold, hard cash at half-price books.

It's funny how we rail against the loss of fair use when others do it, and rally behind the flag when one of our own steps into the ring...

Re:guilty

[crush]

Is Fair Use really excluded by the TOS? Certainly it seems to be damn near impossible to make copies of this stuff (and no, I don't include the code-snippets in that). What should the Fair Use provisions be? Copying up to 10% of the book?

Speaking for myself

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't put books on a shelf to impress people. I put trophies or cool decorative things on shelves to impress people. Books go on shelves to either provide entertainment or a useful reference. Why spend 50 bucks on a tome just to impress people? Nobody assumes you've read the whole thing, they assume you use it to look things up.

Re:Speaking for myself

[grub]

Why spend 50 bucks on a tome just to impress people?

I just buy the bindings and glue them to pieces of 2x4. No one actually takes the books from the shelves.

Re:Speaking for myself

[Bull999999]

Go to a computer book store and get some old books on clearance for a couple of bucks for a cheap way to fill that bookshelf.

Re:Speaking for myself

[Anonymous Coward]

I like that idea! Then I can buy the remainder of the book cheap and without the cover, like all those publishers' warnings in the front of books mentions.

Re:Speaking for myself

[Galvatron]

You know, there are actually places to go when you need cheap books to fill out a bookcase (like upscale hotel rooms and the like). They sell the books "by the yard," and you usually get things like old editions of legal texts, or whatever else would be unsellable to anyone who was going to read it, but looks pretty on a bookshelf. Same idea, really.

Re:Speaking for myself

[KMAPSRULE]

Amen to that!

Safari?

[Jack William Bell]

Oh, I get it! O'Reilly. Animals. Safari.

Heh.

Paper books still useful for display

[lawpoop]

Like the first part of the article mentions, paper books are useful for display, and not just in the showing off sense.

When I walk into my professors office, they have two walls of metal bookshelves stacked to the wall with books. It's like walking into their mind.

With a cursory glance, you can roughly tell what schools of thought they subscribe to, who they've read, their area of expertise, what subjects they're familiar with. It's really nifty.

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[binaryDigit]

When I walk into my professors office, they have two walls of metal bookshelves stacked to the wall with books. It's like walking into their mind.

Right, but what the article poster alluded to and what others are mentioning is that often times the majority of books that one owns are not ones that they have read. In many ways ones bookshelf is like ones online persona, you are free to appear to be whoever you want. So if I wanted to look like a c/c++ god, I'd have things like K&R and Stroustroup, and NOT some "dummies guide", even if I don't know how to properly format a 'for' statement. I always take one's bookshelf with a grain of salt, esp if it's full of books that look like my old college text books did (i.e. more pristine than the ones on the bookstore shelf).

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[LemurShop]

Show me your bookshelf and i'll tell you who you are eh? Or quite possibly, show me your safari bookshelf and ill tell you what kind of geek you are. :)

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[Geopoliticus]

I'm proud to say my books are trashed. You should see my copy of the camel book, it's cover is mangled and held on with tape. The pages are dog eared and wrinkled. Not to mention the book is about twice it's original thickness packed with printed programs and post-it note book marks. One can defiantly tell if a book has been read by it's condition.

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[lwbecker2]

With a cursory glance, you can roughly tell what schools of thought they subscribe to, who they've read, their area of expertise, what subjects they're familiar with.

reminds me of this scene from Good Will Hunting :

WILL : Did you buy all these books retail, or do you send away for like a "shrink kit" that comes with all these volumes included?

SEAN : Have you read all these books, Will?

WILL : Probably not.

SEAN : (indicating a shelf) How about the ones on that shelf?

Will's eyes flicker up to the shelf for an instant.

WILL : Yeah, I read those.

SEAN : What did you think?

WILL : I'm not here for a fuckin' book report. They're your books, why don't you read'em?

SEAN : I did.

WILL : That must have taken you a long time.

SEAN : Yeah, it did take me a long time.

Sean says this with pride. His determined stare and confident manner catch Will a bit off guard. Will rises from his chair and goes to the shelf.

WILL : (looking at book) "A History of the United States, Volume I." If you want to read a real history book, read Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States." That book will knock you on your ass.

SEAN : How about Noam Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent?"

WILL : You people baffle me. You spend all this money on beautiful, fancy books-- and they're the wrong fuckin' books.

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[eXtro]

I disagree, you can only tell if a book has been used by it's condition. I'm currently reading the following two books to refresh my knowledge:

• CMOS: Circuit Design, Layout, and Simulation
  
• CMOS: Mixed-Signal Circuit Design
  

Once I'm done with them they will look relatively unused, other than a couple of post-its I've added either with my personal notes or as book marks to interesting concepts. I just won't need much of the book as a daily or even occasional reference. I'm reading the books from cover to cover and doing most of the problems, sort of like doing a course without a professer haranguing me to do stuff. This is the way it is with most of my texts, I read them, I learn what's in them and then they sit on my shelves for occasional reference.

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[lastberserker]

When I walk into my professors office, they have two walls of metal bookshelves stacked to the wall with books. It's like walking into their mind.

Wrong, you simply pick in what publishers think your professor might find useful for some class. They always trash professors, instructors and TA-alike with sample copies in hope that one of those would be picked up and will bring back home some big booty. People hate throwing aways books, so they stack them. Hence walls of (mostly) unrelated books.

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[tesmako]

> So if I wanted to look like a c/c++ god, I'd > have things like K&R and Stroustroup, and NOT > some "dummies guide", even if I don't know how > to properly format a 'for' statement. As a small side note I warmly recommend K&R over any dummies book even if you can't format a 'for' statement. It's the C book for everyone really :)

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[binaryDigit]

Thanks, I already have K&R (first edition). I was just using the "formating a for statement' thing as an example, I've been a C/C++ guy for over 12 years now, I think I have the 'for' loop down now ;)

Re:Paper books still useful for display

[pongo000]

When I walk into my professors office, they have two walls of metal bookshelves stacked to the wall with books.

I would wager the vast majority of those books are "desk copies," provided free by the publishers as a way to provide instructors with free copies of the textbooks they're using, or to try and and entice instructors to change over.

One of the best ways to build a dead-tree collection I've discovered is to get affiliated with an institution of higher learning. I teach one computer science course a semester at a local community college as an adjunct instructor. Thanks to this affiliation, I have nearly unlimited ability to obtain free copies of dead-tree books.

Libraries

[SlayerDave]

I'm sorry, but reading a book on a computer just doesn't cut it for me. If I'm serious about a book, then I'll shell out the bucks and buy the damn thing. Otherwise, I'll hoof it down to the library and check it out. Libraries are cheaper than this Safari system and have the added benefit of not ruining your eyes and/or fraying your nerves by making you read a friggin book on your computer screen. Maybe one day I'll be more convinced by the concept of e-books, but until then, I'll stick to the dead-tree variety.

Re:Libraries

[kjd]

I agree and prefer dead-tree format, but it's useful to have an online copy for reference while you're actually doing the work. There is a "search code snippets" option that lets you search for code to copy/paste/modify, which is naturally more helpful in an electronic format.

Also it makes for cheap reviews of books you're interested in purchasing, if you're the type who buys a lot of tech books from the publishers included.

Re:Libraries

[maddboyy]

Yes, dead trees and libraries are great. However, you seem to miss out on some of the benefits from the Safari/e-book system. eBooks are great for technical areas because you can cut and paste code examples while you're working on your project. Also, it's much easier to use a computer to search for terms in a book than to try to scan them by eye/hand. Furthermore, one of the great benefits of Safari is that errata/updates are linked directly on the pages. Paper books are great, but you shouldn't underestimate the convenience of ebooks.

Re:Libraries

[Rudeboy777]

I agree, but perhaps Safari's niche won't be replacing their dead tree counterparts, but acting as a try-before-you-buy library. Your local library probably doesn't buy a copy of every new tech book that comes out, and even if it did you can't perform a search against a shelf of books.

The monthly fee isn't peanuts, but if I'm starting a new project using a language I haven't used yet, I can fork over the 20 bucks for 5 books and find the best Python book out there, then try a few others as well.

If this takes off, hopefully it will raise eyebrows at the MPAA and RIAA as to how an online service should be run (printing allowed, emailing content to friends, etc)

Re:Libraries

[Anonymous Coward]

What library do you go to that has all the latest technical books? I'm lucky if my local library has a "How-to learn MS-DOS in 24 hours".

Re:Libraries

[Library Spoff]

Libraries can't afford to keep up to date with every technical book out there. We had just got the Photoshop 6 book in/processed/out on the shelf and back from an overdue borrower when photoshop 7 wa released.

This at least lets you keep with it. of course your local library might have a bigger bookfund than we do :)

Re:Libraries

[Library Spoff]

>> and even if it did you can't perform a search against a shelf of books.

err. most libraries have opacs nowadays. A lot of which are on the web. plus there's the Library of Congress/Bibliosource etc etc

Re:Libraries

[eyeball]

In my 15 years of professional software engineering, I might've read one or two computer books, while the other few hundred were used strictly for reference.

Since safari, I haven't bought a single paper-book. As a matter of fact, I gave most of my books away to my staff. Safari is the first link on my browser's toolbar, and have almost 20 books in my bookshelf, all for reference. There's the added bonus that the books are searchable, which dead tree technology lacks.

Another advantage is you have access to you books anywhere. I program at the office, at home, on the road, and even from coffee shops sometimes. Shlepping books to and from is not an option.

My only complaint is the site is a bit slow, but understandable considering the complexity of the site. With any luck this will improve someday.

Re:Libraries

[etcpasswd]

I agree for the most part, but what about new versions releasing every few months? I have a couple of fat books on Java, just a couple years old. Now I can't throw them out, nor have the motivation to follow those.

Re:Libraries

[ichard]

I couldn't agree more. Books are inherently more pleasant to read than monitors because they reflect light rather than emit it, and because you can read them in any position you like (rather than trying to hold a 21" monitor above your head while lying on the sofa).

Re:Libraries

[stratjakt]

>> There's the added bonus that the books are searchable, which dead tree technology lacks

I have some dead tree books with this fancy breakthrough technology added, they call it an "index" or something like that. It lists keywords and the page numbers where those keywords are found. It adds search capabilities to paper books! I wonder if it's patented.

Re:Libraries

[lwbecker2]

...Otherwise, I'll hoof it down to the library and check it out...Libraries are cheaper than this Safari system

You prolly spend more on gas (or sneakers), not to mention TIME "hoofing" it down to the library. And don't you hate when the library book is checked out or not carried yet?

Not liking to read online is a valid concern, but the comparative cost of Safari is so low as to be irrelevant.

Re:Libraries

[Anonymous Coward]

college/university libraries.

Re:Libraries

[Anonymous Coward]

"There's the added bonus that the books are searchable, which dead tree technology lacks." - Not serchable....Huh? Just because you're to lazy to use a table of contents and an index dosen't mean they don't exist.

Re:Libraries

[SlayerDave]

I'm responding to the responses.

First, the "technical" books I'm most interested in are math books, which don't suffer the troubling problem of being out of date the minute they hit the press. I am also a programmer, so I like and need books on central programming topics, such as the C++ standard library, numerical algorithms, and computational geometry. These, also, are not "bleeding edge" topics and so are likely to be in my library.

Second, my library is not the local neighborhood library, but the Science and Engineering Library at Boston University (I'm a grad student here). It takes me all of thirty seconds to punch in the author into the library's search website to find out if the book has been checked out already. If it has and I need it badly, I can just put in a recall on the book. Also, as a graduate student, I get to check out books for 19 weeks. After 3 weeks, they are subject to recall, but that is not a big deal. Since this is a science and engineering library at a major university, it is relatively well-stocked with many recent CS/tech/programming books.

As for searching, most books have indices and tables of content. These radical advances in information management work surprisingly well - try them sometime!

Finally, I agree that if I were a professional coder or administrator working in IT, I would probably have a need for the lastest book on sendmail or MySQL or buzzword X. If that were the case, Safari might be for me. Since that is not the case, I'll pass on Safari. Besides, as other posters have noted, personal dead-tree libraries can be quite impressive. I hope mine is one day.

Re:Libraries

[yotto]

I know you're making a joke, but come on, how many times have you looked in the index for a word you /know/ is in the book, and not found it there?

Likewise, how many times have you searched a text document for something like "one of the spr" because you remembered a sentence fragment near the part of the file you wanted?

Re:Libraries

[JudasBlue]

You are lucky to have a library that has up-to-date tech books at your disposal. The public library system in Berkeley CA does not offer this luxury. A couple of 6 year old books on making Dynamic Web Pages For Big Profit On Your Home Selling Web Site!!! seem to be the only technical books in the stacks.

I am not a big fan of ebooks in general, but I like the safari system for giving me up to date technical information on whatever I am working on for a yearly price equal to two books. If I am using a book very frequently for a long period as a reference, I want a dead tree copy of my own. But in most cases I am heavily into a tech book for about three weeks, learn the concepts and then the book becomes another dead weight on my shelves, useful mainly for flattening out my tournament vinyl chessboard when it starts rolling up too much at the edges.

Re:Libraries

[Anonymous Coward]

You program in coffee shops?

NERD ALERT! NERD ALERT!

Let me clue you in: Carrying a load of books into the local starbucks isn't going to make you look any nerdier than you already do.

Re:Libraries

[OmegaGeek]

Best click over to amazon - if anyone would have grabbed the patent for "index technology" it would be them.

Seriously - Safari is fantastic. I quite often only need a few pages from a reference book for a limited amount of time, then I'm left with trying to find space for it on my crowded and sagging bookshelves. Safari rocks!

Re:Libraries

[Michael Ross]

Yes, but the value of a book's index is proportional to the effort by its publisher to create a complete index with correct page numbers. Unfortunately, given the apparent speed with which technical titles are brought to market nowadays, the indexes of these books are frequently inadequate and riddled with incorrect page numbers. Most of my programming books have required ongoing additions and corrections to their indexes. Admittedly, the index of an online book may be just as bad as that of its paper cousin (in fact, they are probably identical, except of course for the handy links in the online version). But an online search facility -- similar to that of Safari -- bypasses the problem of errors in the index.

Re:Libraries

[squidfood]

I have two very different types of technical books on my shelves. Some (Numerical Recipies, Mastering Algorithms, Obfuscated C and other Mysteries) are a pleasure to pick up and read for facts and learning. I want dead tree copies.

Some (by far the more expensive and largest) are obnoxious but necessary references on the language/system de jour. I've gone through (multiple editions of) Fortran, Pascal, Unix, C++, Linux, Java, Windows, VB, expensively purging with each change. Give me online!

Re:Libraries

[jallen02]

I have a 10 slot bookshelf to Safari because... the average useful lifetime of the books I read is not very great.

Certain topics change rapidly. Shelling out 50 bucks for a book that will be out-dated in a year is annoying.

I have a well-worn C Reference manual that has served me well over the past 7 years. The content in the book is still perfectly relevant and useful.

I have Java books that are good for making a fire, and little else.

I read a lot of programming books, some of the time on more esoteric/fast moving topics. Being able to have the book for a month and then drop it after it has gotten me started/further with a topic is a godsend. I then only need the books for reference. Usually I can live without a book as a reference since most of the libraries/languages I work with have some sort of reference materials. I really just like books for filling in knowledge gaps.

I calculated it. I would have spent at least 500 dollars on books in the last 4 months without Safari. With Safari I spent maybe 45 bucks(the first month was free... I was hooked after that). The knowledge and benefit to me was exactly the same. It makes it difficult to justify the spendings when Safari fits very well with my programming and learning style.

Some people like to cozy up to a good ole dead tree. I like to also. But when the knowledge is to be had cheaper, I can't refuse the cheaper solution. (With an LCD monitor my eyes no longer get the frying in place feeling, reading a book online doesn't bother me now).

Anyhow, that is my draw to Safari.

(Not to mention the Safari people have been real responsive when I find bugs in the service :)

Jeremy

Re:Libraries

[eyeball]

Let me clue you in: Carrying a load of books into the local starbucks isn't going to make you look any nerdier than you already do.

No, but carrying in a sexy Mac laptop attracts all kind of hot artsy girls.

Re:Libraries

[abhisarda]

You know its time for an ebook library when you force your mind to scan for keywords or paragraphs when reading a dead tree.

Re:Libraries

[SpaceJunkie]

Hmmm.. I think that the most useful thing here would be an ability to download the books to a palm so I could read it there - while using the computer screen for programming, debugging etc...
Considering you can also sit down anywhere and read a book on the palm(I am currently reading the Art Of War), it makes very good sense. However with a system like this, they would probably want to protect their commenrce and design some kind of ebook DRM with expiry, so you cant just leave it on your palm, or beam it to someone else, or even hang on to the book indefinately by faking the date in your palm (a la old shareware hacks).
Not that I advocate DRM at all- but for this commercial model to work they will need it in some way.

Re:Libraries

[SpaceJunkie]

opacs cannot compare with launching search terms on the text of the book. From what I have seen, opacs only covers a few keywords of the book. If the whole text is there, you could search that, not unlike searching web sites. You could use regexps or searches a little like google (without violating recent patents) - using biblio refs as a guide to the rating of books.

decent

[kjd]

I've been using this for a bit, and it's a decent tool. There's a free 2-week trial (auto-rollover to 10-slot subscription) available on the site mentioned.

Interesting to note that many books authored in troff are not available (currently including the Sendmail book from O'Reilly, not mentioned in the review though Sendmail was). Books authored in FrameMaker (and books eventually converted to it) are more easily converted to their online format.

News?

[NineNine]

I was a member of Safari about two years ago. I know I wasn't the first. Is something that happened two years ago generally considered "news"?

Re:News?

[Queuetue]

Probably not, but someone writing a review about it might be. :)

Re:News?

[NineNine]

Good point.

Re:News?

[rudiger]

a lot of things magically turn in to 'news' on a slow news day.

this just in: the sandwich i just had for lunch tasted great...film @ 11, and slashdot story to follow.

Re:News?

[stratjakt]

It's not news to /. until the check clears.

Re:News?

[Anonymous Coward]

I saw a movie called "Star Wars" about twenty years ago, and that was on it's second run. Is there some reason we had all this traffic about it recently?

It's likely a reasonable tool, but...

[jgerman]

... until there is e-paper that is easy on the eyes with a reader that I can stretch out on the couch with, forget it. As a tool a work maybe. But I also prefer to own my books, rather than pay money over and over for them, in the long run, it does turn out cheaper to buy them.

Re:It's likely a reasonable tool, but...

[jamesangel]

What O'Reilly say though is that this is a complement to real books rather than a replacement. I'm sure all sysadmins/programmers regularly come across subjects they are likely to look at once and never again - perhaps the regular [insert obscure programming language] expert is on vacation or whatever. The idea of this is that if you need to use a book regularly, you buy it; but if it is a one-off or you just want to see whats available you can check it out online.

I wouldn't spend $50 on a book when I only need one chapter on one day; this is a compromise.

Re:It's likely a reasonable tool, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

... until there is e-paper that is easy on the eyes with a reader that I can stretch out on the couch with, forget it. As a tool a work maybe. But I also prefer to own my books, rather than pay money over and over for them, in the long run, it does turn out cheaper to buy them.

There is "e-paper"; it's called an iBook with Mozilla :-)

About Safari

[LemurShop]

I have been a subscriber (basic) for about three months and found it extremely helpful. One of my pleasant surprises and very commendable on the Safari guys is that they didn't fall into the drm/encrypted crap I'm sure most publishing houses would fall into in a similar undertaking. You can save a page as html, print it up, do what you want to without having to go through draconian security measures. I still would like to see more New Riders Publishing books; some of the best usability and macromedia books come from them.

Re:About Safari

[binaryDigit]

One of my pleasant surprises and very commendable on the Safari guys is that they didn't fall into the drm/encrypted crap

Not to take anything away from your good vibes towards O'Reilly, but since html is their delivery format, there really isn't much they CAN do about DRM. Once it's in your browser, you can do whatever you want and they can't stop it even if they wanted to. Forgive (and ignore) me if they are using something else to display the content (e.g. java applet, etc). In which case I agree, kudos.

Re:About Safari

[urbazewski]

Back in December Tim O'Reilly wrote a thoughtful essay about why he isn't worried about piracy, he mentions the Safari system there. Some of his conclusions:

Lesson 1: Obscurity is a far greater threat to authors and creative artists than piracy.

Lesson 2: Piracy is progressive taxation

Lesson 3: Customers want to do the right thing, if they can.

Lesson 4: Shoplifting is a bigger threat than piracy.

Lesson 5: File sharing networks don't threaten book, music, or film publishing. They threaten existing publishers.

Lesson 6: "Free" is eventually replaced by a higher-quality paid service.

Lesson 7: There's more than one way to do it.

There was also a /. discussion.

Re:About Safari

[jmanning2k]

they didn't fall into the drm/encrypted crap ... You can save a page as html, print it up, do what you want to without having to go through draconian security measures.
Yes, but have you noticed the unique ID and javascript that's embedded in there? Try downloading a few pages and sharing it with your friends. Or, downloading it and trying to view it when you are offline. Each time, it contacts the safari server and logs your id.
That said, it's nothing like DRM. Simple to view with a non-js browser, or edit out the unique id, but it's a basic measure to inhibit people from downloading and sharing - or at least let them know how often casual sharing happens.

Re:About Safari

[BerntB]

Love it, too.

I use the print to get a few chapters for the subway on paper. (Reading up on, amonst others, the Linux kernel -- second edition came out recently.)

O'Reilly Going Downhill?

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems to me this would have been much more useful in the days when O'Reilly published a number of really great, definitive technical reference books. They used to get authoritative people in the community who knew the stuff to write the books.

No longer. A lot of more recent O'Reilly books are more like, "Using obscureFTPdaemon on Linux-2.1.37," and seem to be written by people who don't have experience with any of those things.

Their editing quality has also gone downhill; there are now many more spelling and grammar mistakes, as well as sentences and even paragraphs that are completely ambiguous or just plain don't make sense. Have the Slashdot editors taken on the night shift at O'Reilly?

Safari is wonderful!

[Geopoliticus]

Nice to see a review on this. I have been using Safari for about 5 months now and I am in love with this service. I use it more as a trial service before I buy the actual book. I go to the site, do my search, browse the books and then choose which ones to add to my subscription. Then if I really like the book, I go ahead and order it. I too have the "hey look at how cool I am because I have these books" disease. ;-) The only problem is no one I work with thinks that animal books are cool... *sigh*

Re:Safari is wonderful!

[arkanes]

I'm in the middle of evaluating it for a coporate membership and I love it. Hardcopy is still great, but being able to search across the content of hundreds of books is really handy.

Re:Safari is wonderful!

[rawrslashdot]

Any idea what the pricing for a corporate membership is? It doesn't look like they publish their rates.

Re:Safari is wonderful!

[arkanes]

We were quoted $399 per person per year. That's full access with an unlimited bookshelf, for up to 10 users. I'm not sure if it gets cheaper or more expensive with more than 10. Just send an email to the link and a very nice person will be more than happy to send you stuff ;) At least thats how it worked for me.

Company subscription?

[prs_013]

You told us how the system works and that it seems to be a great way to be up to date and not waste space.

do they have any company subscription plans which a major company can subscribe to.. so that its employees dont have to pay for it? This might be helpful to even start a virtual technical library similar to the public libraries out there... except that they you wont find Clive Cussler out there.

Coming to think of it, if that occurs, companies can cram more employees into the same amount of space.. cos hey... your cube space just got smaller as you dont need to maintain any printed material at all !! One chair and desk would do... with wireless access and laptops. You would get up only to switch batteries or go to the restroom!!

Re:Company subscription?

[jamesangel]

They do corporate licenses with a free 30-day trial. You have to contact them for it though, I would guess it costs quite a bit.

Re:Company subscription?

[Anonymous Coward]

Safari does sell corporate subscriptions. Go to http://safari.informit.com/?mode=About where you'll find a link to a free 30 day trial for enterprise workgroups of 10 or more people.

Re:Company subscription?

[Wise Dragon]

Yeah, there's a company called Books 24x7 which my company, . subscribes to.

Re:Company subscription?

[ictatha]

The university I work for has a campus-wide subscription. There's a limit to the number of concurrent sessions, but other than that, anyone on the campus network can access TONS of books through Safari.

Send them an e-mail and ask, I'm sure they'll be more than happy to sell your company some kind of site license ($$$).

Re:Company subscription?

[dagnabit]

Sun is doing this... at least, they were looking into it last summer. When I was still working there, I was part of a trial user group. We got unlimited access to it - not just 10 books or so.

The positive response was overwhelming, according to the follow-up email sent out at the end of the trial period. I have no idea what O'Reilly would charge for something like that, but I'm guessing a large-enough company would find it worthwhile to have any employee instantly able to find whatever they needed.

Re:Company subscription?

[Anonymous Coward]

ProQuest (at www.umi.com) offers a "site license" subscription to Safari as one of their products. Geared to libraries, I think, but appropriate for a company's technical library. I was referred to this company by Safari customer support after I learned that I couldn't pay for my subscription on my company credit card (boneheaded corporate policy decision). I've only done basic investigation, so I don't know how different their interface is, or how this "site license" arrangement works (shared bookshelf?, individual authentication?, etc.).

Old News I`m Afraid

[Anonymous Coward]

I used Safari eons ago - it`s been around for ages and ages - this isn`t recent news. Anyway, the key point about Safari (at least when I used it) is that it`s really designed to allow viewing only; don`t expect to download PDF versions of the chapters you look at, only rather dodgy HTML.

Ahh the old surrepticiously placed book trick...

[Space Coyote]

Works wonders, until you bring home that extra-observant super smart girl you've been trying to impress so hard. You thought you had it perfectly planned. Then she points out that the spine on your Complete Works of Shakespere collection is unbent.

Online Books, and somewhat offline.

[glalonde]

I have used the service for about one month now. You can print the chapters of the books, they even have a special link to assist in this, but not save the content to your machine(as per user policy not by force). I use my laptop to read the online content a lot of the time, since as indicated by others, having to be stuck to the computer is not fun. As least with a laptop you an bring the content in bed with you :-) Glen

" 5693 bytes in body"?

[Anonymous Coward]

5693 bytes.

How is that ever going to be useful?

Surely a word-count would be more informative.

Re:" 5693 bytes in body"?

[Anonymous Coward]

It'll tell you if you need to expand your VIC-20's memory to read it...

Good idea

[root 66]

This digital library is a very good idea. For technical reference it's way better to have a online version of the book than having a paper book besides your keyboard (makes my neck hurt very quickly).

Because of that I usually even search the net for some scanned version of books I have the paper version of.

Reading a whole book from beginning to end is much more comfortable with paper versions, though. I also woudln't want to read (for example) philosophical or lyrical text online: these types of books just need paper versions, they're not the same otherwise.

Despite that, nothing beats the beauty of a well filled (real world) book shelf.

I like dead trees.

[silvakow]

I've known about this service for quite a while, and I figure that it's just for people without a lot of book space. I'd much rather have a paper copy of the book than switch between screens on the computer. Besides that, books last forever. Online access to a book for $1.33 may be nice your first time through it, but what if I drop that book from my Safari shelf after a few months and want to take one more look at that sample code? Besides that, I probably wouldn't go through a technical book every two months, and the money for a subscription to the 10 book plan would buy me a paper book every two months. If I want an online reference, I will look for official documentation online. If I want a good walk through, I will buy an O'Reilly book on paper instead of switching screens.

Re:I like dead trees.

[lordpixel]

Books obviously don't last forever. I have a lot of first editions lying around that are painfully out of date.

To see your sample code again, you put the book back on your shelf again. Evidently you need access to it for another month... so you pay another $1.33. If you never look at book again, you've saved $38.66 by finding its not really useful for $1.33. Sounds reasonable to me. The only real risk is opportunity cost - the slot's not there for some other new book you might want to read, but as you say yourself how many new technical books do you read in a month.

I'm not disagreeing with you completely - there's a whole lot of books I appreciate owning on paper. There are also some I wish I'd never bought, because I almost never look at them. This might be worthwhile as a screening process. I mean, if you find you really never take a book off your virtual bookshelf, you might as well buy a paper copy. If you read it through once and never look at it again, you've saved a lot of money.

Then again, there's always the chance of a second edition... and searchable technical books looks like a real plus to me (sometimes I can't even remember which book a code example is in, much less find it in the index!).

I can stand reading documentation onscreen. A good eBook reader would be better though.

Re:I like dead trees.

[Anonymous Coward]

Besides that, books last forever.

Oh really? Can you show me some books that were printed 100 years ago? 200? Maybe you have a copy of some books from the Renaissance? At least with Safari, you can copy the files to your hard drive and back them up to CD. I'll admit that CDs don't last forever, but you can easily make backups and keep moving to more reliable media until we get something that "lasts forever".

Re:I like dead trees.

[kooshball]

Sure, I can show you old books. I've got a 1785 edition of Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations" sitting right in front of me on my bookshelf. Right next to it is a copy of "A System of Logic" by J.S. Mill from 1846. Both are much more readable than papers that I wrote in MacWrite just 15 years ago.

Tried it, too slow, poor indexing

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried Safari for a few months then cancelled. The servers were slow to unresponsive. And even when they were responsive, the books themselves seem poorly indexed. I especially found this true with reference books where you want to find specific info, rather than read from cover to cover. It might be OK for that (reading from cover to cover) but as other posters have pointer out, I'd rather do that with a physical book in my lap rather than on a computer screen. I think it IS a good idea -- and perhaps they can make it work, but it didn't appeal to me. BootedBear (singed in as a coward as ny account appears to be fu'd)

I played with this a while ago

[grahamsz]

The most frustrating thing I found was that they block the sort of offline browser that'd make that content useful. Being able to make use of their books while you are on the road or on a slow or pay-per-minute net connection would be fantastic.

However I used the useful perl skills I learnt from the to write a proxy server which just happened to log the pages for future reference.

Re:I played with this a while ago

[hughk]

Could they block wget? It can give any browser ID that you want, plus referrers. All they can do is to rate limit you.

Personally, I have my Perl bookshelf for on the road. I don't need Safari yet, but the breakeven isn't much considering the price of new books. (a 10 bookshelf is about the same cost as between 4 and 5 real books on your shelf). I guess the next time I need to extend my zoo or to get newer animals, I'll expect to go on safari.

Re:I played with this a while ago

[lightspawn]

The most frustrating thing I found was that they block the sort of offline browser that'd make that content useful. Being able to make use of their books while you are on the road or on a slow or pay-per-minute net connection would be fantastic.

Tell me about it... it took me hours to figure out how to write a script to download entire books for offline browsing. Fortunately they have dozens of Perl/Python books so there's plenty of information on their site explaining how to go about it.

Re:I played with this a while ago

[Richard_at_work]

It loads all pages as the same page name, so i dont know how wget will work with this.

Re:I played with this a while ago

[afinn]

They allow you to print and save stuff to disk, but not to automatically spider large blocks of content. They have some heuristics running to detect spidering. If this happens, you get locked out of your account until you contact their support and explain yourself.

Re:I played with this a while ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Any chance you will be sharing your script? I was planning to write one myself.

Re:I played with this a while ago

[hughk]

Actually, this seems pretty reasonable. I would want to be able to print or save a few pages though at a time for reference. Sometimes I just need the paper version!

Re:I played with this a while ago

[grahamsz]

The way they prevent spidering is to have hidden single pixel links to logout pages.

They dont have any other heuristics afaics, I had my proxy server saving pages and with a tabbed mozilla i could probably click on 30 ppm.

The code is *so* messy that i'm not happy about sharing it, and fairly dependant on my network setup.

Can you hold it though?

[unborracho]

personally, I'm all for reading off of paper books. It gives me a chance to give my eyes a rest from the gleam of the monitor (I'm a poor college student who can't afford an LCD at the moment) and honestly, I can read books easier than I can read text on the screen.

What would be a nice feature of the website would be if you were able to print off a book in its entirety (Acrobat PDF format or Word document or something), buy a binder or something for it.

Although I would miss the softcover after a while, and miss out on the chance to build up a book collection.

Still a good service

Safari offers a 14-day Trial...

[bmundy]

here... safari.informit.com

Download not possible

[Anonymous Coward]

The biggest drawback that I can see, and the one that's kept me from joining, is you need to have an active network connection.

I travel, the books that I'm going to need go with me. I can read on the plane / train / etc. When I get to the customer site, where I have at best dialup access, they are still useable.

I think this is cool from a "I'd like to learn about" perspective without shelling out lots of money. But for a day to day tool, it does not cut it.

No real ebooks

[javatips]

I've checked their website, and it looks like your stuck with reading your books on the Web.

They do not seem to have any option to be able to read your book offline or download it on your PDA (Palm OS or Pocket PC).

When I read a book, I usually use the time I have in public transit. So unless they provide a way to read the books offline (I would prefer on my Tungsten T) it of little use for me (and I'm probably not the only one in that situation).

The service is still neat and a step in a good direction.

Re:No real ebooks

[42sd]

No.. there aren't any real ebooks, but according to their terms and conditions, you can....

Download and store sections of a book's contents
onto your hard drive or other storage device for
your use only for as long as that book remains
available under your current subscription,
whereafter you shall delete any such portions off
all hard drives or storage devices

The part that really bugs me is that you are just renting the books. You're only getting temporary access to the information you need. The second you quit the service, you are left with nothing. Its a great way to get the information you need, but if its a book you're going to use all the time, you might as well end up buying the paperback version instead of taking up one of your precious slots.

Re:No real ebooks

[mrob2002]

I just signed up for the trial, and browsed a book using Opera on the Sharp 5500, and it renders beautifully on the small screen. This is online of course, but there are tools which let you grab sections of sites for offline reading which I'll be trying this evening. It's nice to see the terms and conditions allow you to do this as long as you delete it once your subscription expires.

Re:No real ebooks

[lpontiac]

They do not seem to have any option to be able to read your book offline or download it on your PDA (Palm OS or Pocket PC).

You can do it yourself, though. You need cookies for authentication, which Plucker Desktop won't do ( :( ), but something like SiteScooper or maybe iSilo should be able to handle it fine.

Automated book download

[etcpasswd]

As a recent Safari member, I concur with the reviewer about the advantages. It is a commendable effort to pool and convince so many publishers to have their books online at a fractional price of the hardcopy edition. This definitely is an advantage in the world of ever changing language/technology versions, where the new versions make the old obsolete. However, the Terms of Serivce are't as flexible as the book version.

When I was put up with dialup modem, I wrote a script to download the pages of the book I had in my shelf (I hated waiting for a while before the next page downloaded). Not only did Safari prevent me from accessing the content, but also I received automated emails (one for each attempt) stating that this is unacceptable according to TOS (Obviously, I clicked on "I agree" without reading). Maybe I could have figured out how to fool their detection mechanism in a few more attempts, but low bandwidth isn't enough reason for me to violate the TOS.

Love safari. Wish you could download books.

[spid]

I've been using Safari for a few months now. Although I still like having paper books, Safari is great in that I always have acccess to my bookshelf. No more lugging books between home and the office! One feature I wish they offered, however (are you listening O'Reilly?) would be a way to download a book for offline reading. Having used a variety of the CD bookshelf products for many years, one thing I miss with the online versions is the speed -- going over the web for every page just feels sluggish sometimes. My guess is that the reason they don't offer offline content is because it would be too easy to pirate-from/share-with friends and coworkers. Fair enough. But it seems to me that it wouldn't be too hard to come up with a way to distribute offline content (maybe in a webapp or something) such that it couldn't be shared...

Re:Love safari. Wish you could download books.

[Erebus]

My guess is that the reason they don't offer offline content is because it would be too easy to pirate-from/share-with friends and coworkers. Fair enough.

"Fair Use" is the phrase that comes to mind.

Re:Love safari. Wish you could download books.

[emolitor]

Well you can save and dowloand all the sections of the book you want. You just cant spider a whole book.

Re:Safari is wonderful!-Bibliophile paradise.

[Anonymous Coward]

I would like to see more technical documentation on CD or DVD. Books, catalogs, manuals, etc. As a bibliophile space can quickly run out.

pda friendly?

[perlstar]

Is it possible to get these books onto my pda.
I like learning new languages on the subway...

Depth, usability and reference material

[jj_johny]

I looked at possibly using the Safari system but had a number of problems with it. Instead of Safari I used the Barnes and Noble method - get a cup of coffee at their in-store coffee bar and look at all the books I want. So here are my pet peeves about the whole idea.

1. The books are generally fire and forget arrangements. Not to say the author didn't write a good book but by the time they finish it, the book is somewhat out of date. Thus you get lots almost up to date material.

2. There is no real linkage between the online book and the online resources. So the book, whether in print or on line, just floats out there as a standalone entity.

3. The point of view/writing style/aim of the author really makes some of the books good to read but not good for reference (online or off).

That said I think that it is great that the service is offered but to me the need for good web based documentation is not fufilled by just putting the books online. It would be great to see an paid online reference that was high quality and well organized. For those of us in the tech world taht have to surf through lots of different disciples, the current crop of books, web sites and vendor support leaves a lot to be desired.

Could be so much more useful

[mcgroarty]

Safari could be so much more useful if it'd focus more on acting like an electronic book and less like acting like a website.

Could we please please please have a way of freely adjusting the font size when reading Safari books?

Please please please? I'm sure these are the webmasters' favorites, but they're not in line with other sites, so we have to adjust our fonts on visiting and leaving Safari.

And could we please please please have a way of reading just the book, no banners, side columns, etc... just the content? I know you can collapse the side content, but that saves vertical space where horizontal space is the problem.

Safari's layout sucks extra bandwidth and is pretty painful to navigate on a wireless PDA or a small tablet, where both the metered bandwidth and the small display space are at a premium. This kills all the joy of Safari for those of us who like to read electronic books on the bus and in bed.

Re:Could be so much more useful

[hanmer]

What browser are you using? Mozilla lets you adjust on the fly with Ctrl-- and Ctrl-+. I was very relieved to learn of this feature! It works for me on Safari.

Re:Could be so much more useful

[mcgroarty]

It's not so easy and requires a page reload on each page with ThunderHawk, which is unfortunately the only usable PocketPC browser. Ugh!

Cool, and tempting

[swordgeek]

Understand that this opinion is coming from a stalwart 'real books forever!' type. I've never liked reading documentation on a computer, when a book is available. (and don't even get me started on proofreading onscreen vs. a red pen and a cup of coffee.)

This sounds like a cool idea for tech books. There are too many books I've spent LOTS of money on that I use for six months, and then dump. The StarOffice 5.2 book (at $80) was a fine example, except that I gave up on the whole damned program after about six weeks. (and wanted to after six days).

Tech moves ahead, and too many books get obsolete fast. Just go to a used bookstore and look at the useless old crap books (50 copies of DOS 5.0 for dummies) that consumed trees. This is clearly a Better Way, and it sounds like they've done a good job of implementing it.

Reference vs. Discovery

[borkus]

I think a digital reference is great. However, I spend a lot of time actually reading technical books both to pass time and expand by job skills. Often, I'll read about some feature, tool or technique, then a couple of months later, a need for it will crop up.

My first experience doing this was with the print documentation for MS Office (10 years ago). MS Office used to come with a shelf's worth of books. I was doing end-user training back then and thumbing through those manuals gave me tons of tips and tricks for my classes. Now, all of that documentation is in the on-line help, which I believe has actually gotten worse.

I prefer physical books

[lizzybarham]

I used to have a Safari account and it was nice, but since I could only check out 5 or so books, when I was done with a book and it wasn't in my on-line book shelf, I could not go to it for reference later on, as where my physical books stay on the shelf and I may refer to them at a much later time, possibly even years.

Books as bandwidth

[LinearB]

One of the key ideas behind Safari was the idea of "Books as Bandwidth."

You may own several hundred computer books, but how many do you read at a single time? How many during a 1 month period? 5? 10?

Although Safari is actually a joint venture between O'Rieilly and Pearson (who own Addison Wesley, Prentice Hall, Sams, Cisco Press, etc), the idea of books as bandwidth was Tim O'Reilly's.

Even though most of you would still want hard copies of books that you refer to continually, how many times do you have do learn something for work, and find yourself needing 5-10 tiles? Do you really want to buy 5 books on datamining, knowing that you'll only read a few pages of each, and be done with them in a few weeks? Next month you might need to be setting up a VPN. With Safari, you can subscribe to a half dozen datamining titles this month, and then next month, you can trade them in to subscribe to 5 books on VPNs. That's your bandwidth. Need more than 5 titles a month? Increase your bandwidth.

Sorry for sounding like an ad. I still buy computer books, but I've saved a fortune using Safari. The full text search through the entire catalog kicks ass. People are always coming to my desk to ask me to for something in Safari.

Lynn Bender aka Linear B
www.geekaustin.org

doh! I'm still a moron

[AssFace]

It is all web based.

nice - no physical delivery costs, but the cost instead of maintaining servers and bandwidth.

there are those that will still complain that they prefer the feel of it in their hands - but online and searchable is very nice.

*note to self: read more of the articles before blabbering on like an idiot.

Safari is ...a good supplement.

[digerata]

I started using O'Reilly's Safari service around April of last year, I believe. I was very excited when I first heard about it, immediately signing up.

But what I found was that it just doesn't replace the convenience of having the actual book on your shelf. I found navigating the site very slow at times. Searching for books was excellent, however, searching for text inside an individual book left much to be desired.

In the end, I canceled the service. Only to come back a few months later. It turns out, Safari is an excellent *supplement* to your existing library. How many times have you left a book at home or at work or at a friends house? How many times have you needed just that tiny bit of info that slipped your mind but is an hour away sitting on your night stand? With Safari, I now just check go and look up the book and find that tidbit I missed. Its defitely expensive when you buy the book anyway, but sometimes its invaluable.

What I would propose to O'Reilly is that when you buy the hardcopy, you get the electronic version on Safari as well. I would even pay a premium of a few dollars for this, as well.

Re:Safari is ...a good supplement.

[matchboy]

That's an awesome idea. However, they might fear that you'd acccidently add it to your kazaa downloads folder... in pdf form.. but if you could access it through Safari, that'd be awesome.

Re:Safari is ...a good supplement.

[seosamh]

Does Safari offer PDF? I don't use it (yet) but the
posts I see here refer to saving HTML. I have the networking
and the XML CD libraries, and they're both HTML.

I would definitely pay more when I buy the paper copy
to have that edition permanently in a Safari bookshelf
online, not counting against any Safari subscription
that I pay for. The savings on my spine from hauling
3-4 books to differnt work sites would make it worthwhile
for me.

Re:Safari is ...a good supplement.

[Clownfush]

Great idea for the future - have you proposed this to O'Reilly yet? I too would pay a few pounds premium for the convenience of an online copy. I think would be particularly good for the "Nutshell" and "Cookbook" style titles that are maximally useful in a searchable, cut-and-paste format.

Re:like Netflix?

[matchboy]

Nope... its all online., No physical books.

Re:Of course they could have done something !

[makapuf]

of course they can do someting with HTML: use something else.

What they are laudable for is precisely that they used a simple, user friendly, straightforward HTML instead of a bizarre plugin.

Question for existing users

[binaryDigit]

I just went over there to play around a little. Of course the book that I was looking for ("Mastering Regular Expressions") is NOT available, even though it is an O'Reilly title. Not a good sign. Anyway, I would have thought that there would be a simple and easy to find "submit a book request" button/link, but I couldn't find one. Is such a feature available to subscribers? Have current subscribers found any other "holes" in the library?

Re:Question for existing users

[lastberserker]

These are not holes, some books are old, these are converted and put online based on subscribers' requests. Here:

Most Requested Titles

Despite the growing number of books in Safari, we haven't included all of O'Reilly's books online. (About 75 percent of our books have been added.) However, we get requests from users all the time who expect to find a particular O'Reilly title in Safari, so we thought we'd talk about some of the reasons why some books are not in Safari.

Most of our books are produced using FrameMaker and then converted to XML. Some of our older books were produced using Troff, however, and have proven to be more difficult to convert to XML. In some of those cases, we've decided to wait for the next edition of the book, when it will be converted to FrameMaker. Not all of our books are produced the same way, and we don't have conversion processes set up to handle every arbitrary input format.

We publish about ten or eleven new books per month. On average, we convert about eight of those titles and bring them into Safari. We choose the books we think are the most important to convert, but we don't always make the choice that agrees with all users, so getting your feedback is important.

Re:Question for existing users

[binaryDigit]

Thanks. FYI, the book I mentioned has a new second edition (I would be happy with either) that just came out last year, so it's not an age thing. I guess not that many people are wild about RE's (and so many other books sorta cover it). I wonder if they simply go by book sales to determine what titles to bring out next?

Re:Question for existing users

[lastberserker]

the book I mentioned has a new second edition (I would be happy with either) that just came out last year, so it's not an age thing.

Well, the real question is whether it is in Troff or not. Other than this, MRE is a great book, maybe just too many of us have its paper copy ;-)

plus I can read the books in bed, on the comode...

[lizzybarham]

etc.

Poser Postcard from OReilly..

[mvw]

On the downside, colleagues who come by my home or office won't see my new copy of MySQL Cookbook because it is online rather than on my shelf showing another O'Reilly animal. I might have to print out the covers and tape them to my old school books to deal with that for the time being, but I am sure that Safari Bookshelf is how I plan to spend money on technical documentation from now on.

The solution to that problem is easy.We need

• a show case box, e.g. some plexi glas holder that is able to hold a postcard with a flashy sign that reads "my selection of the month" that you can bolt to your wall
• either O'reilly mails you a postcard with the covers of titles in color print on the back, or you print it out yourself and put it into the show holder to impress your friends.
• an autogenerated PNG image with the titles on the oreilly site, that you can link on your web page to

This has some decoration value, still impresses your friends and you have some kind of documentation what you read, if you collect the cards.

Note: Please send me a subscription, if you steal that idea, Tim. :)

Regards,
Marc

New look/layout

[digerata]

Its interesting to note that it looks like in the past few months they have completely changed their look. Much better looking now!

Even more interesting, the site used to be written in ASP. Back then it was dead slow. Its much faster now. No clue what the code is now.

Re:New look/layout

[Peter Buelens]

Code is still ASP. But the WEB Load Balancer has changed from CISCO Local Director to NORTEL Alteon Webswitches.

flaws inherent to any rental system

[Anonymous Coward]

What prevents one from "checking out" a certain set of books, copying it wholesale, and "returning" it?

Is this the end for the CD bookshelves?

[stienman]

I have two of the CD bookshelves sold by O'reilly, the Unix one and the Perl one. They include one real book, and five full books in an unrestricted/unencumbered PDF or HTML format on CD. I simply copy the CD to a directory on my computer and I have instant access to them.

They were reasonably priced (~$40 US, IIRC).

I can see benefits to having a subscription to Safari - In my position I am viewed as a problem solver first, and maintenance/upgrade/keep-current-with-technology guy second. Being able to add a book to my library for the few pages where it will aid in a specific problem without buying the entire thing is certianly advantageous in this respect. Knowing that the library that I can check books out from is large and up to date is also a distinct advantage.

But it's still overpriced and too restricted. I'm certian many will use it who find value in exactly this system. I'm hoping, however, that it becomes an open market - the copyright holder sells electronic rights at a given price and resellers are allowed to sell them at whatever the market will bear. Right now it's a monopoly with a set price.

They are turning this information resource into a service industry. Services typicially cost a lot until there is more competition.

I'd rather see open source books made more available. The opendocs, various FAQs, etc make up a great knowledgebase (some of which is used as the sole basis for many books we now pay for). But writing well is a chore that requires a lot of work and planning. I wonder if there is a partially technical solution that could be married to an inexpensive organizational solution to facilitate the planning, writing, editing, publishing and distribution of good free electronic books. Publishing and distribution are pretty much taken care of, but we need an easy way to plan, write and edit (more formally than, say, a wiki) comprehensive documentation.

The organization could be supported with sales of paper and CD copies of the books. It would require a few editors and a few good project leaders who can guide (and push) volunteer writers, editors, and proof readers. It may not compete with 'real' books in terms of polish and marketting, but as long as it's correct, readable, and useful we technical types would likely support such an effort.

-Adam

Re:Is this the end for the CD bookshelves?

[Feelgood]

More a reply to the subject, than the content iteself, but O'Reilly has continued to develop and put out new versions of their CD bookshelves long after Safari started so I don't think this is the end.

I am hoping the next step will be the convergence of the two. Select x books that you would like to have on a CD (or just on your hard drive), the system generates a tarball with those books which you can then download and burn to your own CD. They may not be able to do the master index of all books on the fly, but I would be willing to forgo that feature, especially if a search engine is included with each custom bookshelf (as it is now). Price the books ~60% off the price for the dead tree versions.

O'Reilly, feel free to use this idea at no cost beyond a 20 book credit when the system is deployed.

Re:Is this the end for the CD bookshelves?

[Anonymous Coward]

> I wonder if there is a partially technical solution that could be married to an inexpensive organizational solution to facilitate the planning, writing, editing, publishing and distribution of good free electronic books.

Check out the DOSSIER Project, which seems to be an implementation of the ideas you are talking about. Not only is this editted collection of reference material offered in print, you can subscribe to download PDF versions instead. I like the idea.

It is also reviewed on Slashdot.

On books...

[Anonymous Coward]

(Because I have some free time today)

I have books, lots of books. Granted, I get most of my technical information online, but I certainly don't put books up for anyone but myself. Don't you get the same elation when seeing shelf upon shelf of neatly categorized volumes? Can't you look at your library and remember when/where it was that you first read a book?

Every book in my library is special and dear to me. Over there is "Myths of China and Japan." I picked it up at a Books-a-Million when visiting Houston. It was in the discount section, marked down from $29 to $5. Great read. On the second shelf is Kipling's _Just so Stories_. Wonder how the elephant got its trunk? That will answer it. I got that one in a Barnes&Noble while in Ft. Meyers, FL. On the first shelf is Gleick's _Genius_, a biography of Richard Feynman, written of a master by a master. This was purchased at a corner bookstore, since then gobbled up by one of the superstores. It's part of my collection of Feynman references, including Six Easy Pieces, Not So Easy Pieces, Surely You're Joking, etc.. On the fifth shelf are some art and philosophy texts. One of my favorites is _Dear Theo_, an autobiography of Van Gogh from a series of letters sent to his brother. I read this front to back one evening while on a business trip in Little Rock, AK. It's scary, sometimes, that a diagnosed schizophrenic had many of the same thoughts as I do. I'm not saying I have any of Van Gogh's genius, only that his words resonate with me.

Your library reflects who and what you are. It's deeply personal, not for outsiders to gawk at, but for your personal satisfaction and fulfillment.

Is there any easy way to print the entire book?

[Anonymous Coward]

Only in a few locations do I have high speed access. But, we have a 75ppm copier on our LAN

I would like to print the books I have subscribed to out. Is there an easy way to do this?

Re:Is there any easy way to print the entire book?

[Anonymous Coward]

on a related matter, how come the 'print screen' button doesn't actually print out what's on the screen?

that'd be far more useful.

10 Slots != 10 Books

[Anonymous Coward]

From O'Reilly:
Most Safari books occupy a single slot on your bookshelf. In most cases, a 10-slot bookshelf equates to a 10-book bookshelf.
(emphasis added)
*Most*, not *all*. Just wanted to bring it up.

Re:10 Slots != 10 Books

[entrylevel]

Yeah, the pocket references take up 0.5 slots. I haven't seen any that take up more than 1 (yet).

Re:10 Slots != 10 Books

[coljac]

Plenty take up 2 or more as I am now discovering to my chagrin. Only the thinnest of books take up less than one. I think it's proportional to the books RRP.

Re:Of course they could have done something !

[binaryDigit]

What they are laudable for is precisely that they used a simple, user friendly, straightforward HTML instead of a bizarre plugin.

I guess I'm not convinced that their decision on using HTML is based on economic reasons vs any good will on their part. Given their audience, they can't just simply assume Windoze and IE, so any proprietary solution they come up with would have to support multiple OS's and browsers, which we all know is a monumental PITA. Again given their audience and it's predilection towards being against such technologies, they would have a tough row to hoe to get their intended targets to actually even buy in.

Not to say I'm not glad they made that choice, I am, I'm just not convinced that their intentions were necessarily, "pure".

HELP!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

How do I get all this highlighter ink off my LCD screen?!?

"where else read documentation?" come on !!!

[vano2001]

"If it were a Tom Robbins book however, I couldn't see myself sitting in a cozy chair reading it on a laptop; this idea only makes sense to me for technical information because I am sitting at my computer anyways -- and where else would I need technical documentation?"

In the bathroom !!! Don't tell me the guy doesn't read technical stuff in the WC ? That is where Men read stuff. And yes, I have learned quite a lot in the bathroom, as I am sure have many of you.

(no jokes about shitty knowledge please... I have heard them already)

Re:"where else read documentation?" come on !!!

[matchboy]

I wrote the review... and that was my thoughts... but I thought I'd leave the toilet out. :-p

Re:"where else read documentation?" come on !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, so how about sex jokes instead? :-)

Dead trees are better

[Wintermancer]

I tried Safari for awhile. Didn't particularly like it as:

1) It's a bitch balancing a monitor on your lap while your on the shitter.

2) Highlighter on the screen sucks. Especially when you scroll.

3) Higlighting a monitor while balancing it on your lap in the bathroom is just a a home safety accident nightmare.

4) Dragging a monitor into the bedroom will just get your ass divorced fast.

Safari has its place

[nyssa]

I've been using Safari for about a year at the $9.95 for 5 slots level. Although I prefer to use physical books, it is frustrating to have to pay >$30 for a book and only use a small fraction of it. Safari has been great for those kinds of books. However, if I'm going to use the book extensively, or read it cover-to-cover, I prefer the old-fashioned kind.

not news, but lame advertising attempt

[Erebus]

for a failing service that attempts to reap profits from restrictive IP covenants. Nice try, O'Reilly.

I'd like to believe in ebooks...

[eXtro]

I really would. I subscribe to 12 IEEE Journals, purchase at least 10 textbooks per year, Scientific American and National Geographic. For at least some of the IEEE journals I have the option for electronic only subscriptions but I've only ever used it as an additional feature, not the main mode of delivery. Why? Well, with a physical subscription I have permanent access (barring fire, floods, loss or theft I guess) to the volumes. I may cancel a subscription to a periodical because I permanently or temporarily lose interest in it, but I can still go back and look at issues that I received during my subscription period.

I've yet to see a subscription service for electronic anything, other than audible.com, that addresses this. There needs to be mechanisms for realizing that you've invested capital over time and so you should be entitled to some level of access. For Safari it's a little different because the nominal rate per book is quite low, but still, over years it will add up. If I were a subscriber I'd like some sort of benefit for being a long term subscriber who has quit, such as maybe for every full year I can add one of the titles to my permanent shelf (maybe locked to a particular revision, so if for instance a new camel comes out I only have access to the version when I opted out)

One other reason I have a problem with ebooks is the lack of a gloss, I can't easily add my own notes to books unless I print them out and archive them. Oddly enough, the PHP documentation is close to what I want, people can leave notes on each page. I just want a personalized version of it.

Change in times

[prototype]

This generally is where books are going IMHO. As an IT professional, books are invaluable in our research of new technologies, learning new tools, and general reference for our infrastructure and applications. While it's nice and cool to have dozens of books on the shelf that are easy to access, I'm shifting towards the online versions now.

We recently implemented a subscription service for the IS department at our company through a company called Books24x7 (http://www.books24x7.com). They offer personal bookshelves as well and it basically boils down to a few hundred dollars per user. That may seem like a lot but I currently have about 60 books in my bookshelf. Full text search across my bookshelf, or all the books they offer is available as well.

It's certainly a value added service. A lot of people seem to gripe and complain that they don't have the paper version in front of them but a good online service like Safari or any of the other competitors gives you just as much content and flexiblity without having to consume a lot of shelf space. Also I can access my books anywhere (home, office, etc.). Saves lugging home giant tomes of knowledge when I want to do some work on the road. It's not for everyone though, as some people just can't read books online, but for a reference library it really can't be beat.

Re:Safari is wonderful!-Bibliophile paradise.

[soapvox]

Here is a thought, I haven't used the service yet so they may already have it, but because it is already in electronic format why not sell you the content on CD for the full price of the book? That way incase THE SITE GETS SLASHDOTTED you can still get the materials. Just a thought.

What we need is electronic paper.

[pnot]

Electronic paper is one of those things that alawys seems to be just round the corner, but it really does seem to be nearing a useful state now.

Electronic paper, IMO, would be the ideal solution: you have the stuff in an electronic format, and "print" out whichever bit you're currently interested in onto a (say) 64-page electronic paper booklet which is entirely reusable. You get all the advantages of the electronic format (greppable, updateable, cheap and light) as well as most of those of the dead-tree format (read it on the toilet, doesn't occupy screen area).

As far as I can see the only dead-tree advantages you'd lose would be annotation (though touch-sensitive film might solve this) and, of course, the impressive bookshelf factor.

Bandwidth and presentation make this unattractive

[crush]

I'm on a 56k modem and I found that my trial subscription to Safari was not useful for two reasons:

1. It took too long to download the pages which were presented with unnecessary (for presentation) extra framing
2. Having once downloaded a page there was no way to cache it with Squid, so I had to download it again if I wanted to flip back and forth (which is what I do with tech books

I completely understand why OReilly made these design decisions, but it makes them non-useful for me. I prefer to get CDs of etexts or just the good ol' paperback (pity about the reduced quality bindings they've introduced)>

Bookmarklets & CSS

[lastberserker]

If it bothers it too much, do code a couple
of useful bookmarklets and/or custom CSS -
works miracles for me.

OTOH, I agree that having a more elaborated
preferences page would be a nice touch.

great for kids

[kshkval]

This would be great for kids in schools. My 14 y/o daughter - and almost every kid she knows -walks into Middle School every day with a 50 pound + bookbag. The school packs the daily routine so much that the kids have no time to go to their lockers between classes, so they just carry the books with them. This is the same school that forbids PDAs, but gives the thumbs up to "agendas" that reportedly keep the kids organized. Better to give them a laptop, allow the PDA and save some backs and spinal curvatures.

Re:Ahh the old surrepticiously placed book trick..

[kevin lyda]

whereupon she congatulates you on treating books well.

Curious about your sig...

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are talking to me as an AC, you are most likely talking to yourself.

I find this sig very interesting. In my experience, the main reason people post on ./, Plastic, Kuro5hin, or any other community based website, is to hear themselves talk. (Read themselves type?) In that case, your threatening not to reply won't deter anybody, especially if you were going to contradict them anyhow.

Re:Curious about your sig...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the great thing about having an account on Slashdot. You get to rant all you want, and there's always a reason to disregard anyone who disagrees.

It's rather ironic that someone will tell an Anonymous Coward they ignore Anonymous Cowards.

Prefer the CD-Bookshelves myself

[PunchMonkey]

I tried out safari, but for myself, I was quite happy sticking with the CD Bookshelves. For the cost of a couple O'Reilly books you get ~6 on CD-ROM (plus one in print as well) in HTML format. Slap that puppy on your webserver and you can access it wherever you go. I'd usually sell the print copy on ebay to recoup some of the cost.

My biggest gripe with safari was the layout and the speed vs. CD Bookshelves. The CD Bookshelves are as fast as your computer and the pages take up the full browser screen - none of those menus to get in your way.

2 kind of books

[gmuslera]

I choose (well, when I can) what format I want for a book based in how I will read it.

If its a conceptual book to be read from first page to last (i.e. DNS and BIND, or Web Database Applications with PHP and Mysql to name a few) I prefer them in paper, so I can read them in bed, in the bathroom, in a bus or in the beach, where I'm more comfortable for the time that I will be reading it... at least, for the first time is a must.

In the other hand, books like the "in a nutshell" series, or dictionary-like books, or books where I have to read or focus only in one chapter without having to read all to understand, are best reading in a computer. In this category I surely put "books" like the PHP annotated manual. Also for this are best the "cookbooks" or the books that would be useful to have cut and paste. Or even the conceptual books of the first kind, once you have readed it in a printed version and the concepts are enough, but you have to verify something or reread some chapter.

Secret to Cheap Paper books.

[viper21]

I thought about posting a comment about the neat places that you can find O'Reilly books cheaply... less than %25 of cover price.

Not new... but, still.

Then I realized that all of my favorite stores would be Slashdotted and there would be no O'Reilly books left for me.

Scott: 1 - Slashdot: 0

-S

Re:Ahh the old surrepticiously placed book trick..

[Anonymous Coward]

For this kind of situation, you should buy a used book from the flea market.

They use ASP

[tetrode]

Didn't anyone notice?

Mark

Re:They use ASP

[Anonymous Coward]

Jon Udell explains why here:

http://www.oreilly.com/news/udell_0301.html

Where's the FP?

[vbweenie]

I am a Safari subscriber, and find it invaluable for reference searching on things like the MySQL API.

Recently, however, I've started teaching myself Haskell, and I've noticed that there is next to nothing in the range of books - which includes books by publishers other than O'Reilly - on Safari that deals with Functional Programming in general or Haskell in particular.

Mind you, most people doing FP probably have access to very good university libraries, so I guess the market isn't that huge...

Safary needs improvement

[josevnz]

Greetings,

I really like the idea of the Safary books; Actually i'm a big fan of their books (my bookshelf is full with their titles) but i have to say than the service should improved:

- When i registered i got problems with my password. I managed to register, paid with my credit card but the system didn't recognized my password. I emailed their tech support and the problem was fixed in a day.
- The service is a little bit expensive. I can always go to Barnes & Nobles and check the book, and if i like it i'll buy it (i do that for books i really like). On the other hand if you're into using 10 books just to throw them away after some time then this is for you.
- Their policy for changing books is a little bit restrictive (how much time you have to wait to change a book title on your digital bookshelf). Some times you just want to check the book contents (on similar books). Maybe if they offer a comparison review for each title that would help to make better purchases.
- Last time i used their HTML was not working on Mozilla. I use Linux, not Windows at my work and their site should be browser neutral or at least should work with other browsers.

Rigth now i'm not using the service; Probably if they fix the problem then i will start using their service again.

JV.

Error in review- some books consume multiple slots

[SuperKendall]

The review is pretty good (I am a Safari subscriber myself), but there was one big error that anyone considering the service should be aware of - some of the books in the service consume multiple "slots". For example, an EJB pattern book I wanted cost two slots. So the 10 slot plan (which I also have) does not necessarily mean you can hold ten books at once...

I think the multiple slot thing might be for really large books that fetch a lot of money, not many seem to take up more than one slot.

How I use it, and why it's a good service

[Gil Da Janus]

As usual with the /. crowd - they want their cake, they want to eat it, they want it everywheere, they want someone else to gather the parts, mix well, edit well, host it well, and of course, want it on their platform of choice (even if it won't fit), and, of did I mention, they want it to be free to boot.

I've been a user of Safari for over 16 months and I find it a very useful service - especially once they got other publishers and authors to jump on the band wagon. When they started this, it was ONLY O'Reilly books - and not very many of them.

What drew me to the service was the ability to have access to a set of books and not have to cart them from home to the office (even when you live 3 blocks from your office, a pile of books every day is too much!), or off to a meeting with a client.

That way if I have a particalar question on something I'm actively working, and I'm home, I can just look at it on the web on the shelf of books I have checked out.

There is one feature that would be nice - if you are subscribed to a book, get a special discount if you order a physical copy - yes, you still need the book sometimes, but it has gotten less. Lots of the folks in the office use this service - and O'Reilly does offer office plans.

I recommend the service, it's not for everyone, but if you can afford it, it will pay for itself.

Gil

safari is great, but...

[illusion_2K]

Like many other slashdoters, I signed up for Safari way back when it was introduced. After a while I found myself using it periodically and eventually cancelled the service. The fact that the library at my university also provides free access to approximatly 140 books on Safari was also a big influence here.

That being said, Safari is a great service that is well worth it for sysadmins and programmers. I've found it to be a great way to learn about a multitude of things when I either don't have any books relevant to a given subject and google just doesn't cut it.

Now, what would make it really killer would be if that when you purchase a book via safari, you could pay a small additional fee (say $5) to have free access to that book via Safari for a year or two. However I'm sure that this would piss of O'Reilly distributors and bookstores that carry their books to no end. (hmmm... kinda like the RIAA)

1 Slot 1= 1 book?

[theguru]

When I evaluated Safari last year, most books took up more than 1 slot in your bookshelf. Beginer, and "SQL at a glance" typee books took up 1 slot. Intermediate and pure reference books took up two, and advanced books took up 3.

Is this still the case? It made the system actual value a lot less that it initially seemed. A 5 slot shelf can only hold one advanced book and 1 reference book at a time. At $9.99/mo, I decided it was better to purchase these books.

Re:Error in review- some books consume multiple sl

[matchboy]

My error for lack of research. I wish I would have known that before I wrote it. Good point though and I'll make sure I add that to my personal copy of the review. Thanks!

License agreement

[Anonymous Coward]

I followed the link, and the license agreement says you may use the information you have access to for:

"personal, non-commercial use".

i.e. if you want to use if for your job, you have to get a corporate license.

I like this because it might force companies to buy licenses for their staff. I dislike it because it (rather badly) breaks any analogy you might have with real books, and it screws consultants (who are, let's face it, a whole group for whom the Safari concept could be a very useful one).

On the whole, this sucks.

Please forgive me if I've misinterpreted the license agreement and this is not the case.

More features please

[Engdy]

I'm another happy Safari customer, but I wouldn't mind an enhanced bookmarking system that should be plenty easy to implement. Currently, for each bookmark, I have to delete them individually by clicking on a little trashcan icon, and each time going to a separate confirmation page. It would be nice to have a checkbox next to each bookmark so I can delete them in batch. It would also be nice to option out the confirmation.

Mod Parent Up!

[Anonymous Coward]

Information wants to be free! How is this any different than sharing MP3s with your friends?

kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

so how long will it be before someone reads book and puts it on kazaa ?

Wot no indignation?

[jbuhler]

At first, I was surprised that the comments for this article hadn't degenerated into a flame-fest about IP models and renting vs buying books. After a bit more thought, however, I think there are two key factors that make this model appealing.

Firstly, many if not most O'Reilly technical books have a fairly limited useful life. They must evolve to track tool version upgrades, and many potential users don't need the content of a particular book for longer than it takes to complete a project. Secondly, the service offered is not rental of a specific book, but rather online access to a broad library of titles. You're paying for the convenience of not having to find a physical lending library that carries the book.

What other books would be appropriate for such a rental model? If you could access Springer-Verlag's yellow books online under a similar model, would you do it? How about a library of major American literature, 1920-1970? How about a library of (mostly pot-boiler) mystery or scifi titles? If the usability issues can be worked out, I would seriously consider buying a monthly subscription to an up-to-date online scifi library (think of a much expanded version of what Baen now offers for free). It would probably be a better value than the tripe I get from my cable TV subscription.

Two last items for thought, however. First, if this model becomes as successful as I think it could, will we be in danger of losing the option of purchasing a book outright? Second, what will be the fate of public libraries?

Quick introductions

[ogren]

I generally have two classes of computer reference books: books I use on a regular basis as a reference and books that I used to learn a topic and thereafter use only occaisionally.

I'm finding Safari really useful for that second category of book. I can use a Safari slot on a Ruby book, read through it over a few weeks to get an understanding of how it compares with what I already know. I can then remove it, putting it back on the Safari "shelf" if I need to use it for reference.

I guess I use Safari a lot like other people would use a traditional library, checking out a book every week or two. But I don't have access to any traditional libraries with the up-to-date technical books that can be found on Safari.

Safari isn't going to mean that I never buy a book again, but it is going to mean that I won't be shelling out as much information on "casual" techical reading.

Re:Of course they could have done something !

[Wanker]

Not to say I'm not glad they made that choice, I am, I'm just not convinced that their intentions were necessarily, "pure".

Their intentions were probably not "pure" from an idealistic standpoint. However, when I can read through books like Richard Stevens' TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 1 in Mozilla on Linux, I'm glad they made it available and so compatible-- pure intentions or no.

Preview a book 30 days for $1.50

[LarryRiedel]

I have used Safari for about 6 months. It is marketed as something where you can access a particular book online for as long as you pay $XXX per month for that book (e.g. $1.50/month). If I am going to be using a book ongoing, I will just buy the book, as I find accessing the site (or pages I saved to my disk) vastly less convenient than having the paper book in my possession.

However, I continue to use Safari because I do not need to keep a book longer than 30 days, so what I can do is have access to a book for 30 days for about $1.50, and if it is something I would like to have around, I will buy the paper book; either way, I take the book off my Safari bookshelf after 30 days to make room for another book I can preview for 30 days.

I suppose I could go to the bookstore and buy the book and read it, and return it if I do not like it, and that would be cheaper, but I do not want to make that many trips to the bookstore. :-)

And of course if it is a book I only feel a need to read through once, then I do not even need to consider buying the paper edition.

There are other pricing options for people who want to preview more or less than, say, 10 books per month.

Larry

At least Safari is lighter...

[Anonymous Coward]

"The Main Library at Indiana University sinks over an inch every year because when it was built, engineers failed to take into account the weight of all the books that would occupy the building."

Now all I need is a 3' x 3' monitor...

[crashthud]

Great idea - current books I can access as long as they're useful (everyone out there with obsolete books being used as footstools/table levelers/bookshelf ends, raise your hand).

But my desk usually has a pile of books open, face up or down or with pencils or yellow stickys marking pages. I'm still looking for a way to map this to a single too-small-already computer screen.

Safari Is A Reference

[lousyd]

I'm a dead-tree book fan, as many others are. Even technical books, I like to have the freshly cracked spine tucked into my lap.

But I disagree that physical books are necessarily better than the Safari concept. That misses the point. The best way to think of Safari is as a reference. You know all those times when a question crosses your mind and you run to the computer, head for Google, and type in your search terms? That's exactly when Safari comes in handy. You'll still need to Google to know what year Edison invented the lightbulb (he didn't, Woodward and Evans did), but if you want to know how dynamically allocated ports work, it's right there in TCP/IP Network Administration.

It's kind of like man pages. They're just there, waiting for your inquiry. They're a reference tool.

I don't read 10 books a month and then trash them

[AdiBean]

I feel that the reviewer here is a bit overly enthusiastic about Safari. Here are my points:

First and foremost, the reviewer tries to make a cost justification around being able to read 120 books a year at $1.33 per book. This is nonsense. There are two differing uses for technical books. I buy technical books to come up to speed on new subjects. This generally means reading a book on the subject cover to cover. In this scenario, the above cost model might work, except that I certainly don't do this with 10 books every month.

In fact, I feel the more common use for technical books is in a reference role, and this is where Safaris's pricing model is weaker. A reference book is one that you will keep for a long time, using it routinely on an ongoing basis. If a reference book has a three year life span (before becoming technically obsolete) then you have paid $32 for that book, and you don't even own it. I don't find this particularly attractive.

A previous poster suggested that purchasers of a physical book be given that book on Safari as well (presumably on a permanent basis, and it would not count against your bookshelf size). This is an excellent suggestion, as it solves the reference book problem I describe above while allowing me online access to the book when I don't want to carry the physical copy.

Alternatively, Safari should make it possible to permanently purchase a title (maybe at half the physical book price, or something). A book thus purchased would stay on your bookshelf forever, and would not count against your bookshelf size.

A second issue that I currently have with Safari is the selection of publishers. If I go into Borders, or online to Amazon, I pretty much have access to all available books on a subject. The list of available publishers simply is not adequate at Safari for me contemplate changing the way I work. In particular (at least in my case) I pretty much must have Wrox, and the Sun Java books published by Prentice Hall. I didn't see either of these publishers in the reviewers list. (OK, I admit it, I am too lazy to see if maybe they are actually available, but not listed in the review!)

If Safari can address these two issues, then it will be much more compelling for me.

Cautious Optimism About Safari, But With Concerns

[skSlashDot]

I've looked at Safari recently and I'm cautiously optimistic about it, but I do have a couple of concerns.

1. When my home network is down because my routing software is screwed up, I need to connect to the Safari website to find a book on routing so I can try to figure out what's wrong, but I can't because... the network is down.

2. If civilization were to collapse, or if O'Reilly goes belly up (God forbid), I'll still have my dead trees. How can I know that those books will be available online a year from now? Or five years from now?

Ultimately, though, I need to start moving to some eBook-ish sort of; the amount of technical reference I need to have on hand grows every year, and my apartment isn't getting any bigger.

tricking the customer

[iion_tichy]

I guess I don't like it for the same reason that I don't like paying for online news etc.: I don't get to keep what I pay for. I bet in the end it costs more to do all this renting than just buying the books. I have another solution to the shelf-space problem: rent books from the local library for free. Of course it would be great to have the information available online the instance you need it, but it's still to expensive this way...

A long-time user's review

[Wiseleo]

I've been a Safari user since early last year and a user of the free MCP Bookshelf since about 1998. I only bought a couple of tech books in 2002. The rest of them are available to me online at any time.

My subscription level is set to "Large" and I have quite a few books checked out at any given time. I can access my books via my PDA wirelessly whenever I want to read them outside work environment. Having Doyle's Cisco books (huge tomes) always available with me has enabled me to solve quite a few problems right on the client site. I also keep handy manufacturer-specific SQL references, database design and architecture books, and really just a lot of very useful information.

None of my books are sold for less than $50 and thus Safari is a terrific value.

how does O'reilly publish online and in-print?

[goon]

Have you ever wondered how Oreilly is able to publish the same book online and in print? .... think DocBook . There is a section in the online book (free), 1.5.1. A Short DocBook History that describes how Oreilly developed the necessary tools and systems to allow separation of content and presentation.

DocBook is almost 10yo (1991) and shows how a company can successfully publish (what ever the medium) using sgml/xml. Remember this the next time you see some "...xml is next thing...", hype.

• ...There's a common misperception that, because there are no printing and shipping charges, ebooks should be less expensive than print books. Yet, these functions account for only about 15 percent of a book's cost...
  

I do however have a gripe about the costs of online v's printed book. It urked me to read this. Whatever way you look at it (even if they update the contents), a book beats the web hands down. It's my book I can carry it around, I can lend it out, photocopy it and not have to pay repeat subcriptions.

O'reilly does however have the Open-books section that allows you to read some titles online for free.

• 
  [links:]
  DocBook - DocBook reference online (free)
  Interview with Jon Udell about Safari - http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/news/udell_0301.ht ml
  Open books - http://www.oreilly.com/openbook/ free and out of print books online.

Repeat after me

[Anonymous Coward]

"Encrypted PDF"

NOTE:light-emitting displays may inhibit cognition

[arawvegan]

Frank Zingrone wrote, in the Media Simplex (published 2001 by Stoddart,
ISBN 0-7737-3293-4), pp.78-81: "Since television viewing severely reduces the healthy stimulations of high-beta wave activity in the brain, we should expect that the patterns of chaos in healthy brains are missing in television viewers, and there is strong evidence that they are. Studies conducted at the Australian National University in Canberra by the Emerys, a husband and wife team, determined that television viewing reduces cognition to low levels and thwarts learning, in the normal sense of material being subject to conscious recall.

"The evidence is that television not only destroys the capacity of the viewer to attend, it also, by taking over a complex of direct and indirect neural pathways, decreases vigilance- the general state of arousal which prepares the organism for action, should its attention be drawn to specific stimulus." [the Emerys]

"The Emerys display their findings in a "Summary Map of Relativities for
Radiant and Reflected Light Perception." This chart shows the slowness
and relative speed of brain-wave activity given specific tasks. The
results when compared across several other investigations are clear: all
perception attending to television viewing is considerably slowed down,
whereas watching reflected light, from film to book reading, produces
significantly faster brain waves."

"It remains to be seen just what effects projection TV has on brain-wave
function."

"Television viewing leaves the left hemisphere almost in darkness.
Magnetic resonance imaging and EEG techniques, too, give us mesmerizing
pictures of the brain's dynamic actions. These techniques show that
verbal centres shut down and all lively brain activity is severely
reduced in response to tv watching."

He then goes on to write about how CRT/VDTs (including computer monitors,
and this would include LCDs, though perhaps less) incur similar effects
in hampering learning.

Re:How does it cost to advertise on Slashdot?

[matchboy]

If you feel that my review is a "stealth advertisement"..how do you come to such a conclusion? When I was given a demo account of the service, I said that I would give the Safari Bookshelf a fair review after a few weeks. If there is another service such as this, I would love to view it and give it an honest review. I don't see how my review is any different then reviewing a book, cd, game, restaurant, etc.

O'Reilly has sent me an email with an big thank you and they are very happy that I enjoyed my demo of the system.

You may already have access

[l00sr]

My university has what amounts to a campus-wide subscription. Can't hurt to check if you're a student/faculty at an academic institution.

Dead Trees and Electronic books

[Anonymous Coward]

Dead Trees? I'd point out the computers run on electricity and are manufactured from parts requiring a good deal of energy - most of which is derived from dead plants and trees (coal and petroleum), except that these dead trees are not only non-renewable but represent a once-only use. A printed book not only has a potentially long lifespan but also multiple use.

E-books do serve a extremely useful role but the technology and infrastructure required to maintain and use them is equally hard on the environment.

As interviewed by Mo Rocca

[Anonymous Coward]

if you can afford it, it will pay for itself

If this were the Daily Show, they'd have you saying this line as their "Moment of Zen" at the end of the show as Jon Stewart makes snide faces...

Cut and paste

[Anonymous Coward]

you can cut and paste code examples while you're working on your project

Actually I do use cut and paste all the time. It's annoying when I go back to that part of the book later though....