Re: regarding the 2nd Book Of Linux Music & Sound

[Dave Phillips <dlphillips@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Greetings:

First, thank you to everyone who responded to my original query. I now 
have a much better idea how I want to do this project.

I definitely want to involve members of this group. Some of you have 
offered to take on particular chapters, and that seems to me the best 
approach. I believe we can complete the work in record time by spreading 
the work around. I'll speak with my publisher about this plan. If he 
approves this approach we'll start work immediately.

Some respondents wrote to me off-list and have offered to assist. I'll 
be in touch with you all after talking with Bill Pollock. If Bill gives 
us a green light I'll start organizing the distribution of work 
immediately. I'll communicate directly with you regarding style 
preferences, format requirements, deadlines, etc. I must emphasize that 
this project is commercial work, i.e., we'll have editors at the 
publishing house and there will be demands that certain dates be met. 
Please, only take on the work if you're sure you can work under those 
conditions.

If the community approach is accepted I'll post a list of topics and 
areas that need attention. I have a large amount of unedited/incomplete 
material that I'm willing to offer as starting points.

I've been thinking about the royalties issue. I'm far from a final plan, 
but I think it might be possible to route some (all?) of the royalties 
to the Linux Audio Consortium. The community can then decide how to use 
it. I can't leave this issue vague, my publisher will need to know who 
is in charge of accounts receivable, and I can't simply accept 
contributions from the community and not reimburse those contributors. 
How that reimbursement takes place can be left to the individual 
contributors, or we may decide to simply throw everything in one 
direction (e.g. linuxaudio.org).

Btw, I especially appreciate the community's response re: the 2.4 kernel 
series. It is laid to rest, there will be coverage only from kernel 2.6 
upwards. Thank goodness.

No Starch has already accepted my outline for the project. At some point 
I'll post that outline on the Web for the community to consider. 
However, please bear in mind that there will be limitations of space and 
scope. I'm unlikely to be able to cover games, consumer devices, or 
telephony. Alas, material for a programmer's guide will probably not be 
accepted. IMO that really requires a separate book now. A developer's 
guide to ALSA and JACK is certainly timely and needed, but I'm not the 
one to write that book.

Again, if you're interested in writing for this project please contact 
me off-list. Specifiy your area of interest and we'll go from there.

Best regards,

dp