• Home
  • Site Aliases
    • www.cloud-native.info
    • oracle.cloud-native.info
    • Phil-Wilkins.uk
  • About
    • Background
    • Presenting Activities
    • Internet Profile
      • LinkedIn
    • About
  • Books & Publications
    • Logging in Action with Fluentd, Kubernetes and More
      • Logging in Action with Fluentd – Book
      • Fluentd Book Resources
      • Log Generator
    • API & API Platform
      • API Useful Resources
    • Oracle Integration
      • Book Website
      • Useful Reading Sources
    • Publication Contributions
  • Resources
    • GitHub
    • Mindmaps Index
    • Oracle Integration Site
    • Useful Tech Resources …
      • Oracle Tech Resources inc Open Source
      • Useful Tech Resources
      • Python Setup & related stuff
  • Music

Phil (aka MP3Monster)'s Blog

~ from Technology to Music

Phil (aka MP3Monster)'s Blog

Tag Archives: ebook

Packt Christmas $5 Promotion

18 Tuesday Dec 2018

Posted by mp3monster in Books, General, xxRetired

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

ebook, Packt, promotion

Head over to Packt.com to take advantage

Yes it’s that time of year and Packt have launched their Christmas Promotion where the books and videos are all $5 (£4.76) including the two I’ve co-written and others I’ve tech reviewed.

Based on past trends, this is the best time to get any EBooks you want from Packt, there are other promotions but not as good as this!

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

All Packt Books $5

22 Friday Dec 2017

Posted by mp3monster in Books, Technology

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

$5, API, books, ebook, OIC - ICS, Packt, promotion

You know its Christmas because Packt are running their all ebooks for $5 promotion.  Including those I have co-authord and even the ones we’re working on at present.

Our books …

I hope you enjoy the books.

 

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

My experience writing a technical book

26 Monday Dec 2016

Posted by mp3monster in Books, General, Packt

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

AMIS, book, ebook, integration, OIC - ICS, Oracle, Packt, press, publishing, writing

We have just supplied our publisher with the final draft of the final chapter in our book about Oracle Integration Cloud Service (ICS). Before we get too chilled out waiting to see the printed article as Packt Sort out the final publishing I thought it might be helpful to share some observations from our experiences.

Let’s start with some background. I have been acting as a peer reviewer for Packt for some years now, and in fact Packt had approached me in the past to write a book, however I had declined their proposals as I didn’t want to write on a subject that people had already written about. So when I was introduced to ICS, this felt like a good subject to write a book on, certainly represents something that it is going to have a significant future and deserved a book to help people get beyond a basic user guide.

Choosing to write a book is not a small undertaking, so make sure you’re going to do this for the right reasons. Let’s be honest, very few books make much money. You have to be  lucky, writing a subject you know us going to be game changing (think Gang of Four and Thomas Erl) or have a definitive text on the next big thing that everyone will use. Publishers also run promotions, discounts and give aways, some more than others, but that will all eat into you share, not to mention unless you self publish or you’re a rock star author you will not see big percentage royalty rates coming your way.

So first steps, for us was to get a publisher on board, given it was an Oracle product I wanted to talk to Oracle Press (or here) first which is run by McGraw-Hill. They weren’t too sure about the idea, having not been successful with previous cloud books. So we went back to Packt, they do have Oracle based books, and I had a relationship there.

With some initial positive feedback, I needed to get things moving. Thinking through this I concluded that the entire book alone could be a lot of very hard graft when working with a new product and I didn’t have the access to the same level of resources working for a customer organisation as you can with an Oracle partner company. So I needed a co-author who was involved with ICS, and ideally working for an Oracle partner. I had seen Robert van Mölken blogging about ICS, and working for AMIS suggested he would be a very capable person, not to mention AMIS is a respected partner. Robert has shown himself to be more than capable, and getting him signed up to the idea was a good call.

Next, was to start properly developing the idea, which means chapters, subheadings, and  book introduction.  Very quickly the chapters and subsections where finalised, along with our approach to the examples. I was very keen that the examples where routed in plausible scenarios and that would help the ideas without getting caught up explaining the detail.  Not to mention the examples should feel less superficial. Additionally, we have recognised that a book about a cloud solution means that things will move far faster than something that is deployed on-premises, so how we approach this book needs to hold true and relevant even if there are new features and aesthetic changes for a good while.

We divided the work up between us, I think Robert in hindsight took on the more troublesome chapters, in so far needing to understand more social APIs. So when plotting out the division of work, also think about the technical challenges you might have and need to explain. Whilst you won’t have this in perhaps a ‘hello world’ level of functionality when you past this effort builds up, if you’re working on a cookbook it may we’ll be an important factor.

Our original goal had been to publish in time for Open World. But the realities of a job, both of us being active with events such as user groups meant these things would eat into the available writing time as demos, presentations would also need to be written. We also uncovered a couple of bugs that delayed things, both in waiting for the patch, but also confirming that what we where seeing was a bug, and not an issue of understanding.

In hindsight I think perhaps we should have done more work during the planning to  build the example scenarios. There is no doubt that planning before actually writing makes a significant difference. It would have given us more time in working through the questions and challenges. The risk would have been that it would have been a lot longer before we actually produced some content, and there is certainly something psychological about getting those initial chapters written.

1905356542-video-conferencing-webmarketing-inner-blog-umr8sp-clipartDuring the core writing phase Robert and I would gave weekly call to catchup, it meant that we could discuss the chapter scenarios, details, and assumptions that meant we were aligned. Whilst not necessary, and this could be done be email, a short conversation was a lot easier and it helped keep focus. Not to mention probably reduced the differences in writing that can occur with different authors.

When comes to the writing itself I found the clearer my thinking was on the specific  points I wanted to convey the easier the writing became and the writing of the chapter just flowed. The question I still haven’t really answered in my own mind is whether I should have been a lot more attentive to the formatting the publishers wanted us to adopt, applying it retrospectively took a couple of passes as you would spot something that had omitted the correct style. But diligently applying the right styles would have been disruptive to the writing style.

153493174We found that most chapters overran the page count by about 10%-15% the publisher was pretty cool about this – they definitely agreed a good book over a book that was edited to a specific length was most important. We can put the over run down largely to the fact we didn’t allow for the formatting of the page, which meant more white space that we had anticipated, plus in the drafts we needed to put additional publication notes in such as references to the images being used. It is worth looking at this before finalising your chapter lengths.

The last thing we did during the writing of the 1st drafts was reviewing each other’s work before submitting the chapters. This probably helped a lot in so far as Robert would often pickup on issues with my screenshots and I would tend to finesse wording – when you write in a more conversational style those little quirks of speaking can come through.

thumb_colourbox10196464Completing all the chapters in 1st draft felt pretty satisfying, and certainly a morale boost as we had overrun our original estimates, as it meant we where we we’re well over 50% complete, probably nearer to 75% complete in terms of effort. In the contract with Packt this was also the 1st milestone for the advance, which is a long way into the process and the payment has yet to be received. Some of this delay has been organisational, but things don’t happen quickly on that front.

Before we started the project one of the Oracle Ace Directors we knew provided some observations, suggesting that each page will probably take a couple of hours to write. I have to admit to being a little sceptical of this as it would mean roughly a year of writing every evening for both of us if you look at it from an elapsed time it isn’t so far from the truth. If you look at the actual effort, those weeks where I was just working on the book rather than presentations or work demands. I think it would have been fair to suggest about 8-12 hours of effort went into the book each week which is about 450 pages in length. In the end I think we probably where writing at twice that speed if you measure effort from 1st to last draft.

Colorful letters background. 3d rendered illustrationSecond draft is about addressing the review feedback from the peer reviewers. For us that was pretty straight forward,the feedback we received was very positive and making suggestions on how to improve things. As we wrote about a cloud product that is developing and improving quickly we needed to double check the screens hadn’t changed. We did see 1 challenge in the reviewing.  We wrote the Preface to help provide context to the book, but I didn’t get sent before the 1st chapters went to review some comments as a result perhaps weren’t so intune with the books underpinning goals.  Should the reviewer need to have had the preface first, debatable. We took advantage of this lesson, to reduce the dependency on having read the preface.

Most changes where about fixing formatting, then adding a couple of additional screenshots and some clarifying text. Each chapter probably only needed 1 additional paragraph per chapter. So working through this was pretty quick. Then it has been over to the publisher to finishing things off and assemble the book.

Going forward, we will continue to write additional material, initially for the blog (oracle-integration.cloud) but we are exploring the idea of a living book where the book version will undergo quarterly updates. But time will tell as to whether this makes a difference.

The book can be found at:

  • Packt
  • Amazon

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

eBook(lets) from O’Reilly

27 Tuesday Sep 2016

Posted by mp3monster in Books, General, Technology

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

architecture, Big Data, booklet, books, creative commons, Design, development, ebook, ebooks, free, open books, oreilly, vJUG

I received an email through the virtual Java User Group highlighting the availability of a couple of eBooks around Java published by O’Reilly. The details are below. The books are more booklets (nothing wrong with that). The key difference being that they are shorter and focused on one or two focused subjects (in this case Java 8’s Lambda’s & Streams) which is great because I don’t want a whole Java book again, I just want to get a handle on the key changes and language innovations. It is worth highlighting that these aren’t just ‘free chapters’ which is what you see happen sometimes as the goal of the book is described, doesn’t depend on prior chapters to work the illustrated material and structured with the appropriate cover material contents, index etc so works as a discrete entity.

This approach seems to be coming more common at O’Reilly at least as a marketing device, and we have seen this being done with the Dummies brand where the booklets have then been printed as conference give aways.

Some may argue that this is a reflection of our ever shortening attention span with books. This maybe the case for some, but I suspect it is more about providing some that is more digestible than a ‘free chapter’, but more importantly reflects the recognition that for books that are providing guides (as opposed to reference books – which I’d include patterns books) people don’t want to buy a latest edition of a book where the 1st chapters are exactly the same as the previous edition of the book and that the only significant change is a new section on Lambdas for example.

Any way the latest book details received are:

Introducing Java 8
by Raoul-Gabriel Urma
Offers a practical tutorial to some of the core Java 8 features and gets you programming quickly with Java 8.
Object Oriented vs Functional Programming
by Richard Warburton
Explains the similarities and differences between functional programming and object oriented programming with Java focused examples.

http://insightfullogic.com
@RichardWarburto

The other book(lets) that have drawn my attention to the trend include:

  • Static Site Generators
  • Migrating to Cloud-Native Application Architectures
  • Software Architecture Patterns
  • Little Book of HTML/CSS Coding Guidelines
  • Java the Legend – history of Java
  • Designing Great Web APIs
  • Modern Java Script
  • Hadoop with Python
  • Release Engineering How Google Builds and Delivers Software
  • Functional Programming in Python
  • 20 Python Libraries You Aren’t Using (But Should)
  • Monitoring Distributed Systems
  • Little Book of HTML/CSS Frameworks

In addition to these Book(let)s O’Reilly offer a range of ‘reports’ such as:

  • Mapping Big Data, Evaluating Machine Learning Models, Data Driven  (the full range can be seen at Free Data Reports)
  • Open by Design
  • Design for Voice Interfaces (Siri, Cortana etc)

 

In addition O’Reilly have a page on ‘Open Books’ (here) – covering significant texts O’Reilly have had some involvement in but published under licenses such as Create Commons.

 

  • [18-01-16 Update] New booklet added for Modern Java Script
  • [13-03-16 Update] New booklet Continuous Delivery With Windows and Dot Net
  • [14-03-16 Update] New booklet Modern Java EE Design Patterns
  • [13-08-16 Update] New booklet Release Engineering How Google Builds and Delivers Software and Functional Programming in Python
  • [16-09-16 Update] new booklet
    • 20 Python Libraries You Aren’t Using (But Should)
  • [19-09-16 Update] New Booklet Monitoring Distributed Systems
  • [28-09-16]New Booklet Little Book of HTML/CSS Frameworks

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

Java EE Development with Eclipse 2nd Edition

06 Tuesday Oct 2015

Posted by mp3monster in Book Reviews, Books, Packt, Technology

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

book, ebook, Eclipse, java, Packt

I have just been told that the 2nd Edition of Java EE Development with Eclipse has now been published.  This is another book that I have supported as a technical reviewer.  Looking forward to receiving my print copy so I can see how my suggestions and feedback have carried through to the final copy.

You can see the book on the Packt site with  https://www.packtpub.com/application-development/java-ee-development-eclipse-second-edition  or Amazon here

 

IMG_2232

Here is the finished article!

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

…. For Dummies

23 Wednesday Sep 2015

Posted by mp3monster in Books, General, Oracle

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

'For Dummies', book, Cloud, Dummies, ebook, HR, Oracle, SaaS, virtualization

It seems to becoming the done thing to license the use of the ‘For Dummies’ brand and publishing books (or are they large booklets) on a specific subject. These can then often be picked up as print freebies at conferences. I saw a couple at the Oracle Cloud Event today – though I’d share the ebook versions here:

  • Database Storage for Dummies
  • SaaS for Dummies
  • In Memory Data Grids for Dummies
  • Enterprise Mobility for Dummies
  • Server Consolidation for Dummies
  • LTFS for Dummies
  • Modern HR for Dummies
  • Social Recruiting for Dummies
  • Enterprise Cloud Infrastructure for Dummies
  • Server Virtualization for Dummies
  • Enterprise Computing with Oracle Solaris for Dummies

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

Packt go free with Oracle again for next 24 hours

25 Tuesday Aug 2015

Posted by mp3monster in Books, Oracle, Packt

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

11g, ebook, free, ODI, Oracle, Packt, Packt Publishing

Packt have made another Oracle book available for free today as part of their Free Learning initiative. For the next 24 hours you can get a book on Oracle Data Integrator 11g Cookbook from https://www.packtpub.com/packt/offers/free-learning

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

Packt Java EE with Eclipse 2nd Edition

19 Wednesday Aug 2015

Posted by mp3monster in Book Reviews, Books, Packt

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

books, ebook, free, Packt, review

Might be a little early for Packt, but I have completed reviewing the 2nd Edition of Java EE with Eclipse for Packt now.  So the book should be available in the next couple of months.

On the subject of Packt, the Free Learning scheme they are running continues. I’ve seen a couple of books repair since the start of the promotion. But for main part each day is new and different and covers a wide range of things from JQuery and Node, to Hadoop and into Drupal and WordPress. So worth checking back on a daily basis.

All of this means time to do some more Oracle writing.

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

Free eBook

15 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by mp3monster in Books

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

ebook, oreilly

 book 
Designers must understand user needs to create any product. But what type of data should you look at?While we’ve all heard about big data, talk of “thick” data remains scant. Generally speaking, big data is quantitative; it gives you the what, where, and when, while thick data provides the qualitative perspective—the how and the why.

Pamela Pavliscak, founder of design research firm Change Sciences, says you need all the data—both big and thick—to fully understand how users interact with websites, apps, and other products. In her new report, Data-Informed Product Design, she outlines a way to use data of all kinds to understand the relationship between people and technology.

Up until now, there hasn’t been much information on how to combine quantitative big data with qualitative thick data. That’s where this report can help. If you’re involved in any aspect of product design, this is indispensable reading. It’s useful, and we’re pleased to offer it to you, for free!

Get the free ebook now.

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...

Latest Packt Publishing promotion

05 Tuesday May 2015

Posted by mp3monster in Books, General, Packt

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

ebook, free, Packt, promotion

Packt are repeating the promotion that they ran earlier in the year where each day they give away a free ebook. The books so far are (at least from my perspective) a little niche – developing for Kinect for example. Go check it out each day until the 17th you might see something that works for you.

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Print
  • Pocket
  • Email
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Pinterest
  • WhatsApp
  • Skype

Like this:

Like Loading...
← Older posts

Aliases

  • phil-wilkins.uk
  • cloud-native.info
  • oracle.cloud-native.info

I work for Oracle, all opinions here are my own & do not necessarily reflect the views of Oracle

Oracle Ace Director Alumni

TOGAF 9

Logging in Action

Oracle Cloud Integration Book

API Platform Book


Oracle Dev Meetup London

Categories

  • App Ideas
  • Books
    • Book Reviews
    • manning
    • Oracle Press
    • Packt
  • Enterprise architecture
  • General
    • economy
    • LinkedIn
    • Website
  • Music
    • Music Resources
    • Music Reviews
  • Photography
  • Podcasts
  • Technology
    • APIs & microservices
    • chatbots
    • Cloud
    • Cloud Native
    • Dev Meetup
    • development
      • languages
        • node.js
    • drone
    • Fluentd
    • logsimulator
    • mindmap
    • OMESA
    • Oracle
      • API Platform CS
        • tools
      • Helidon
      • ITSO & OEAF
      • Java Cloud
      • NodeJS Cloud
      • OIC – ICS
      • Oracle Cloud Native
      • OUG
    • railroad diagrams
    • TOGAF
  • xxRetired

My Other Web Content & Contributions

  • Amazon Author entry
  • API Platform
  • Dev Meetup (co-managed)
  • Fluentd Book
  • ICS Book Website
  • OMESA
  • Ora World
  • Oracle Community Directory
  • Packt Author Bio
  • Phil on Blogs.Oracle.com
  • Sessionize Profile

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 2,541 other subscribers

RSS

RSS Feed RSS - Posts

RSS Feed RSS - Comments

February 2023
M T W T F S S
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728  
« Jan    

Twitter

  • File system replication is now available as a fully managed solution for your enterprise workloads with #OCI File S… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…Next Tweet: 4 days ago
  • Find out how NIBIO's Smart Forest research center utilizes @OracleCloud to store, process, and apply #AI to data to… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…Next Tweet: 5 days ago
  • .@TechArena's latest ebook "Seven Strategies for Maximizing Organizational Return” highlights #OCI. Bev Crair discu… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…Next Tweet: 5 days ago
  • Clever use of SSH tunnelling, Applies to multiple Linux flavours and Windows .... blogs.oracle.com/developers/pos…Next Tweet: 5 days ago
  • 25% done with Let's Do It, by Bob Stanley goodreads.com/user_status/sh…Next Tweet: 6 days ago
Follow @mp3monster

History

Speaker Recognition

Open Source Summit Speaker

Flickr Pics

Pembroke CastleSeven Bridge Crossing
More Photos

    Social

    • View @mp3monster’s profile on Twitter
    • View philwilkins’s profile on LinkedIn
    • View mp3monster’s profile on GitHub
    • View mp3monster’s profile on Flickr
    • View philmp3monster’s profile on Twitch
    Follow Phil (aka MP3Monster)'s Blog on WordPress.com

    Blog at WordPress.com.

    • Follow Following
      • Phil (aka MP3Monster)'s Blog
      • Join 217 other followers
      • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
      • Phil (aka MP3Monster)'s Blog
      • Customize
      • Follow Following
      • Sign up
      • Log in
      • Report this content
      • View site in Reader
      • Manage subscriptions
      • Collapse this bar
     

    Loading Comments...
     

    You must be logged in to post a comment.

      Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
      To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Our Cookie Policy
      %d bloggers like this: