Write a technical book

I got the contract with O’Reilly, no animal picked out yet. Testing and Debugging Ruby on Rails. So far i’m a little slow on the writting part, i’m making some progress through. 5 years ago

well, it’s been over 5 years now since my last book was published, and I’m getting back into the saddle. I’ve signed a contract on a book about Ruby for the Pragmatic programmers. I’ve started writing, and hope to be able to make some more detailed announcements around RubyConf. 5 years ago

With O’Reilly, as a co-author on the Asterisk Cookbook. I’m really excited, i’m sure though by the end i’ll hate myself for doing it. 5 years ago

Check out http://www.jaasbook.com/ 6 years ago

This will be a copy of the comment I made on “write a book”, but it still applies:

It took up well over 6 intense months of research and writing almost to exclusion of everything else, but holding this book in my hands and seeing it on shelves is so great. While I know it’s not going to be a classic by any means, and if it sells a few thousand copies I’m very lucky—but it’s mine, and I did it.

Here’s more about my experience, on my blog.6 years ago

PHYSICAL THERAPHY is the corner-stone to BLISH. 6 years ago

Not sure what it would be about but I probably should do this 6 years ago

I admit, I added this AFTER I got a book deal. go fig… I swear that it is on my list of goals. :-) 6 years ago

I was in the right place at the right time, knowing the right people and was asked to write Streaming Media Demystified. They say writing a book changes your life and that was true for me, only the changes were a mixed blessing. On the whole, it was worth doing and I developed a taste to write more, though I don’t have a current publishing deal for other things. 6 years ago

I’ve got just about everything out of the way to send in my contract to PragProg. Then my time will be split between MetaRuby, the book, and new games like Xenosaga 2 and GTA: San Andreas. 6 years ago

yeah hard work but always fun to see it up there on the shelf; or even better at a bookstore (or, by now, half price books) 6 years ago

I’ve been working on a book about JAAS (the Java Authentication and Authorization Service) with co-author Chip Holden for several months now.

We’ll be wrapping up in the coming months and publishing…I hope. 7 years ago

Off to PragProg for their approval! 7 years ago

Not worth doing if you want to make money from it, but it certainly gives you a better appreciation for every other book you read. 7 years ago

Writing a tech book is a LOT of work. Much more than I expected it to be, and I expected it to be a lot of work.

It also doesn’t pay especially well, so you’ve gotta be in it for the fame, rather than the fortune.

Oh, and the fame is rather limited, so you basically just have to be a geek who likes the subject you’re writing about.

But it’s still damn cool to see your book in dead tree form, I must admit. 7 years ago

Dave Thomas announced Facets of Ruby which means I could write a smallish book on DRb and Rinda. I’ve already got a few DRb/Rinda articles7 years ago