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If I simplify a bit, I see two different approaches: 1. You write something broad as you say. You present many options to the reader. The book is not practical
by thanato0s 6y ago
If I simplify a bit, I see two different approaches:
1. You write something broad as you say. You present many options to the reader. The book is not practical anymore, because you don't speak about something in particular but some general ideas. As a result, the readers can't really practice with a concrete project, and they might end up lost in an ocean of links. If I wanted to do that, I would have created another "Awesome list of Linux tools" on GitHub.
2. You write something more focused, as I did: the readers can practice, you can describe and explain everything they're doing because the focus is more narrow. You eliminate a whole class of problems as well, because you know exactly the tools they're installing and using. As a result, you enable them to understand what's happening.
I went for the second solution, because I think we lack books which are really practical. I wanted the readers to be actively engaged into a project, learn by practicing, and be able to swap every tool they want afterward. Because they'll have a deeper understanding of Linux, a modal editor, a tiling window manager, and so on.
It's not because I use these tools that I want to impose them to the world. I choose these tools for the book because they allow the reader to understand what's happening under the hood. Even if I was using another wm or another distro, I still would go with these tools, because it allows me to teach what I want to teach. Because they're not too difficult for beginners if you explain them right. I think people are smart, and I think they can learn way easier than most people think.
To me, Ubuntu is highly opinionated. Who cares? It's not about me, it's about what the readers can learn from the experience. I'm not convinced you learn a lot by installing Ubuntu, or that you understand the benefits to work with a tiling manager, or you understand the important place of the shell in the Linux ecosystem.
Thanks for the good luck :)
- philipkiely 6y agoIn my opinion, you're absolutely correct to write a focused, narrow book as that's the only way to stand a chance of addressing a topic completely. The information available on the internet is vast, as authors it is more often our job to surface, connect, and curate a tangle of information to give readers, as you said, practical direction.
- thanato0s 6y agoThanks for that. It's reassuring. I've always tried to do exactly that, and my readers were always thankful for this kind of direction, so... I continue :)
- brudgers 6y agoI guess what I am getting at is the vitality of book recommendations not technical merits. There’s nothing wrong with Arch, but I hesitate to recommend it without knowing someone pretty well. The same with Zsh over bash and neovim over Vim. As personal choices backed by experience it’s a different context than a tutorial for others. That’s what I am saying.
- haswell 6y agoIf someone is diving down this rabbit hole, they most likely have some level of tech savvy going in. Given that, they likely can decide if the book is for them by doing some very light research on Linux distributions. With a cursory set of results in hand (which will tell me that Ubuntu is easy and Arch is a bit more advanced but not quite as advanced as Gentoo or LFS), I can decide if a very practical book that says it focuses on Arch is a book that is right for me or not. For me: I'd LOVE this book. I've been around the block, but don't know everything I know I could. Your criticism doesn't seem to have much merit when clearly there is a market for this book and clearly the potential buyer should be trusted to decide whether this book is right or not.
- brudgers 6y agoIt doesn’t need to be a rabbit hole. Or at least no more of a rabbit hole than essential.
- SatvikBeri 6y agoThis answer convinced me to buy the book, books like (2) tend to be my favorites. Looking forward to it!
- thanato0s 6y agoThanks! I hope you'll like it! If you have any question, feedback, or problem, don't hesitate to write me an email. It's on the page where I sell the book.