Re: What would an "An Official" GNU Emacs Book look like?

[Emanuel Berg]

Richard Stallman <address@hidden> writes:

> I guess you must mean me, and by "propagandistic"
> you must be deprecating the goals of freedom which
> are the reason for GNU, GNU Emacs, and all the rest.

I don't mean propagandistic in a negative way, but it
is my impression there are a lot of such material
available, so that book isn't missing.

On the "political" bookshelf I would think the most
important book missing (?) is the book about the
iPhone, Android, etc. hysteria which have turned
millions of would-be independent computer users into
mere consumers with no own activity or creativity
whatsoever to it. It is very painful to see because to
me it is the opposite of what makes computers fun,
which is it is virtually a half-empty bucket for you
to fill with your own initiatives and creativity, and
contrary to all other such activities you only need
a computer to do it, and it doesn't even have to be
expensive. And now they are taking that away with
those interfaces and pre-chewed "apps" that turn
people into zombies...

> I am not interested in writing a book that would
> focus on technical details and omit what I think is
> really important.

If you aren't interested of course you shouldn't do
it. But I'll explain what I mean. The technical
details don't need to be that technical. The Emacs and
Elisp manuals do that.

It would rather (it "won't" rather) be a book with
your attitude to technology, what is appealing and how
you approached it, and your whole experience with it.

I love anecdotal history, which is often more telling
than conventional wisdom. For example this book:

    @book{quarter-century-of-unix,
      title      = {A Quarter Century of UNIX},
      author     = {Peter Salus},
      publisher  = {Addison-Wesley},
      year       = 1994,
      ISBN       = 0201547775
    }

has many colorful stories, and the best is perhaps how
they did yacc which is hilarious (and probably true).
It is a book on technology insofar none non-computer
person would understand a single page, but it isn't
a listing of the options of GNU ls, either. (I take it
is OK to mention such books that do not compete with
free counterparts.)

I know many people would love to read a book from
"beyond GNU castle". It would be also be invaluable
for future generations if we talk altruism.
>From a practical standpoint it would generate some
money, don't you think?

-- 
underground experts united
http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573