Re: Customized Electronic Text collections

[Bill Ries-Knight <brk@slip.net>]

Ray, I can see you are kinda on board with this line of thinking.  My wife is the
teacher, and she sees it as a NECESSARY step forward.

More comments below in your original...

Bill

Ray Olszewski wrote:  in part....

> Some components of this idea are old hat, and others are hard to implement.
> I say this not to discourage you, but to try to focus the discussion on
> finding ways to overcome the real problems, which I see as basically the
> hardware side of this idea, not the content/software side.
>

In keeping with  your later comments, I think that the software side needs some
discussion.  The hope is that the full contents of a document, including
specialized info regarding fonts and characters specific to the text could be
imbedded, either as a "portable font" or as a bitmap image indexed within the
text.  After discussing this with one of the E-book type developers, a bitmap is in
the current thought process.  I would look to a document spec using a data header,
similar to RTF info, that can be ignored on a strictly ascii reader or referenced
by the endowed reader to plug the goodies in where needed.

>
> The old part:
>
> Text-file collections of public-domain literature have been around for
> years. The old Project Gutenberg is a name many will remembe, and there was
> at least one big site in the UK as well. I'm out of date on what's happened
> to these efforts, but they should be easy to track down.

The current location for this project is, http://www.promo.net/pg/index.html.
I did run into the Project Gutenburg people at Seybold.  I didn't think to talk
about this idea though.  Another missed opportunity.

> There's also a commercial part to this: several publishers sell CDs with
> technical texts on them. Two sources that many on this list may recognize
> are O'Reilly (www.ora.com) and Dr. Dobb's Journal (www.ddj.com/cdrom). These
> commercial CDs aren't cheap, but they do deliver real savings over their
> print equivalents.

The hope is to use "copyleft" type documents for more current technical items.
Textbook rights would obviously require seperate negotiation.

>
> The new part:
> ....
> So ... I think the best way to pursue this idea is to focus on the problem
> of creating a small device (say the size and weight of a mass-market
> paperback, about 7" by 4" (and 1" thick), and 10 ounces - apologies to the
> Europeans, but I still don't think metric) that has a decent display, some
> means of interacting with it (stylus-based, perhaps?), and some way to get
> the texts into mass storage (small hard disk? the things they use in cameras?).

The hope is a standard VGA port and firewire or usb connection to the outside world
to extend an otherwise self-contained device.  Grid did some marvolus things with
stylus based devices.  A flash memory card ala PCMCIA standards woud be great.

> It also needs to be inexpensive enough that there could be a way to assure
> that each student had one -- think about pricing comparable to the TI
> calculators that math classes use

The cost savings to a district that pays upwards of $70 per "Approved" text would
offset this to a large part.  Tracy,  Califrnia has a progran in "beta" right now
using modified laptops ( closed to school relaed use, they die if not docked in
like 5 to 10 days with the school).

> -- and have sufficient battery life that
> poser losses would not disrupt classrooms. (Does anyone know how school
> handle these issues now in the context of calculators?)

If developed using flash memory, power use is minimal.  Just have an exchange
program for the batteries and a AA option.

>
>
> An embedded Linux solution would be nice for it; there's certainly been work
> along that line. If the device were available and priced aggressively enough
> that it gained market share, the initial content would be easy to collect
> and organize for presentation.

Just what I would hope for.

>
>
> If this were accomplished, it would provide a bettere basis for efforts to
> create modern electronic texts, something that has been discussed on this
> list, than the desktop (or expensive, breakable laptop) computer. It would
> be a major step forward ... though to move past classic texts, it would need
> support for extended character sets and some way to present illustrations.
>
> Not being a hardware guy, I don't know what the current difficulties are in
> making high-quality, small displays, particularly ones that incorporate
> touch sensitivity or some equivalent. I don't use a PalmPilot or WinCE
> device myself, but based on limited experience from trying them at store
> displays, I doubt they are good enough to support the kind of sustained and
> concentrated reading needed for novels or textbooks.
>
> At 03:36 PM 9/2/99 -0700, Bill Ries-Knight wrote [in part]:
>
> >As I fought through all of this stuff a vision began appearing before my
> >eyes.  A portable device or CDROM type package, with "Standard Texts" to
> >work and study from, instead of lugging around binders and books.
> ....
> >Here is the thought.  It would be nice to be able to access standard
> >classic texts such as Homer, Plato, Descartes, as well as more modern
> >standards, and work with them ineractively (cut and paste to a word
> >processor) as a student resource.
> >
> >The major benefits I see are:
> >Lots of texts on a single CD, custom compiled for the school.
> >LOWER COSTS, more reflective of Royalties than of Production.
> >Fewer items for a young person to lug around.
> >Easy replacement of the texts in case of damage or changes.
> >Local control, even at the school or insrtuctor level.
> ....
>
> ------------------------------------"Never tell me the odds!"---
> Ray Olszewski                                        -- Han Solo
> Palo Alto, CA  94303-3603                       ray@comarre.com
> ----------------------------------------------------------------