Re: [gnugo-devel] Publishing manual for GNU Go

[Lisa M. Opus Goldstein]

address@hidden <address@hidden> wrote:
> The latest edition is 3.4. It is in the gnugo-3.4 tarball
> (which is now at ftp.gnu.org).

I will take a look - thanks for the pointer.

 
> I sort of doubt that it is appropriate to publish it as a book.
> The program is very much in flux so the documentation becomes
> quickly out of date. 


Will an older version of the manual be so out of date as to be
unusable after 1 year?  Two years?  

I can plan for a shorter reprinting schedule if needed, depending on
the needs of the program.  Normally I try to publish a book for 2-3
years; however there are some books that are republished after one
year because of extensive program changes.

> Moreover the market for it will be rather small.

Actually, I am surprised that you say that.  There is a huge market
for classical games, especially programs at a high level.  By
distributing the book with binaries (including a Windoes version), I
think it will bring the program to the attention of people who
otherwise would never find out about it.

However, I am not familiar with the "Go universe". Is there already a
widely commercially available program in bookstores that GNU Go would
be going head-to-head with?


-Opus


 
> Daniel Bump

-- 
Lisa M. Goldstein           address@hidden
Managing Editor, GNU Press  www.gnupress.org
Business Manager,           Tel 617-542-5942
Free Software Foundation    Fax 617-542-2652