Subj : Solaris
To   : David Drummond
From : Lawrence Garvin
Date : Mon Oct 30 2000 11:16 pm

David Drummond said in a message to Lawrence Garvin:

 DD> Books rarely ship with the latest version of anything. It takes so
 DD> long to put the book together, and publish it, that the software
 DD> has often move forward one or more versions...

The believe that "it takes so long to put a book together" is a misunderstood 
belief. I've seen books on retail shelves that took less than 90 days from the 
time the author turned in the final manuscript.

In fact, just last night I bought a book with an Introduction by the author 
that was signed "July 2000".

It's merely a matter of the committment of the publisher and author to 
producing a timely and marketable product. Books that ship with old versions of 
software don't sell. Books that can't ship with current versions of software 
generally don't include software.

Lest we forget, also, the Linux development environment is atypical of the 
software industry. At the time (1995-1998) Linux kernels were being upgraded at 
the rate of one every 30-60 days.

--- 
 * Origin: lawrence@fido.eforest.net | The Enchanted Forest (1:106/6018)

.