- Thu Oct 08, 2015 8:48 am
#30875
Howdy w11,
I was recently approached by a publisher of real books to write a book on ESP8266 for real world money
I thanked them for the offer but declined. If I went that route, I would have no more time to spend on tinkering with this free book.
This speaks to my mentality on why I tinker with such projects ... and the answers are, as always, rich and varied. First I enjoy it. Since I am not being paid to write the materials, there is no motivation to keep tinkering with this stuff unless I enjoyed it
Second, like all of us in the IT business, there is a "warm glow" to feel that one is able to demonstrate some value and give back. Today, with my hand on my heart, I can say that (to the very best of my knowledge) none of the words in the book have come from any other sources and all recipes and techniques have been tested by myself before being written down.
Where do I get the knowledge for the book? The answer is clear ... I scour the Espressif PDFs, I read these forums, I read the Espressif BBS, I watch you tube videos ... and then I think about what I understand the knowledge to mean or say, and then I write it down. I doubt there is an original idea in the whole book. It is a compendium of collected knowledge. However, in the IT world, I think that is the reality for the vast majority of IT knowledge. It is for heroes like @iggr and others to break new ground and come up with new inventions that have never been seen before.
Now ... back to the question. I have made the choice not to seek external contributions for the book and also, not to accept contributions offered. Why? Because I've been badly burned going down that path in the past. The ESP8266 free book is just one of many free books I've created over the last 30 years. Back in the 90s I was massively into Wikis ... I thought they would revolutionize how IT knowledge was distributed ... however ... for me ... that turned out to be orders of magnitude more pain than I could have believed. I then moved onto writing PDFs and accepted written chapters and paragraphs from others ... and then the bun-fights started where arguments arose about my choice to change the content or re-word ideas or include or exclude sections ... and suddenly it wasn't fun anymore (see the start).
So ... for better or worse, I've made the choice that this book is going to be closed content (i.e. only I get to say what is in it) and hence there can never be bun-fights on who said what and who gets credit and where.
What I'd suggest is that folks like yourself and the many others out there who are skilled in ESP8266 continue to study it and write papers. Those papers can be published in your own blogs or community blogs and links published in this forum and elsewhere. In fact I believe Richard (the owner of this site) has already put out a call for blog article writers. There is already a Wiki attached to this site which has GREAT content in it. If you learn something new, write it up in the Wiki.
And finally ... and I really, really encourage this ... write your own book. My personal style of learning is to study something, try it out and then write it down in a PDF for future reference. There is nothing better than to write your own words on a topic so that when you read it again in the future, the language is the language of your own mind. I never set out to write books ... instead I write down what I learn and if what I am studying is large enough, it grows from 3 pages to 10 pages to 30 pages and onwards. I've been studying the ESP8266 for months and months. On average, I doubt I have written more than 2 pages a day and on a subject as deep and broad as the ESP8266, one can write 2 pages on a topic without breaking sweat.
Free ESP8266 book available for download
here.
