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Advice On Creating an Open Source Textbook?

Posted by kdawson on from the not-for-mammon-alone dept.

Occamboy writes "I wrote a slightly successful (30,000+ copies sold) computer communications textbook a number of years back that was published via the traditional textbook publishing route. The royalties were nice, but, frankly, the bigger money came from the boost in my professional standing (I'm a practicing engineer, not a professor). I also felt bad when the publisher hiked the price dramatically every year because students were stuck once a professor adopted a text — $50 for a smallish paperback seemed very high (although I like to think what they learned was worth it!). I'm thinking of writing another textbook, this time about the practice of software engineering in critical systems, using the experience I've gained in the decades I've spent developing, and managing the development of, software-driven medical devices. Poking around on the Net, I've found several intriguing options for distributing open source texts, such as Flatworld Knowledge, Lulu, and Connexions. This concept of free or inexpensive texts intrigues me — the easy adoption and lack of price-gouging. Do any Slashdotters have experience with this new paradigm? Any suggestions or experiences to share from authors, students, and/or professors, who've written, read, or adopted open source or low-cost texts from any source?"

3 of 178 comments (clear)

  1. unfortunately... by Odinlake · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...I suspect many professors still feel a textbook lacks legitimacy unless it's hard cover, thick and there is a substantial price tag connected to it. I say this so as to suggest that "free" might mean it won't be as widely adopted as the authors first one.

  2. Make sure you're clear on what you want to do by ceoyoyo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Do you want to write a free textbook, manage an open source textbook project or host/start a wiki textbook?

    If you want to write a free textbook, go for it. There are several examples you can find, some by pretty big names.

    If you want to manage an open source textbook project be warned that if you want a professor to use it you're going to have to assume the role of editor and put up your reputation to vouch for whatever goes into it.

    If you want to start a wiki textbook project, there's no shortage of wiki sites, but nobody is going to use it in an official capacity. Just like Wikipedia doesn't fly in academia, wiki texts don't either.

  3. My experience (Objective C for Apple) by kanweg · · Score: 4, Insightful

    With help from Alex Clarke and Philippe Mougin I wrote a tutorial on programming in Object-C, aimed at absolute newbies. It was released as a PDF and a great success. Over 200k copies were downloaded by people interested in programming for the Apple Macintosh (or perhaps iPhone). You can find it here:

    http://www.cocoalab.com/?q=becomeanxcoder

    It was translated by volunteers in several other languages, amongst which Chinese and Arabic. Cool!

    Bert