thinking of freebsd public literature

[Kevin Kinsey]

Jim Stapleton wrote:
> I notice a dearth of FreeBSD books by various publishers. It might
> help to have a nice book out by a big publisher. Any interested in
> and/or knowledgeable enough to write a book for O'Reilly Press (or
> some other big company, but they seem to be top dog for a lot of tech
> books). I could help to an extent, but I'm not heavily knowledgeable
> enough about security, and really have only been using the OS for
> about a year.
> 
> -Jim Stapleton

Hmm, "Grog" (Greg) Lehey has "The Complete FreeBSD".  The original version
is very old, but he updates it and has had several updated editions
published.  He recently released the sources and compiled formats via
an F/OSS license (CCL?); I can't exactly remember his reasons
(anniversary of original publication, I think?) for doing so, but it's
a fine book and a canonical reference.

Michael Lucas has been a prolific author --- Absolute (pre)BSD,
with versions of "Open" and others[?] for (pre).  (And the original,
IIRC, was simply "Absolute BSD" but I don't remember which Projects he
concentrated on).  I believe these are published by O'Reilly.

Note that FreeBSD (like most projects of its nature) is quite the moving
target, and many readers seem to prefer a short "how-to" (which varies
somewhat from release to release) as opposed to a larger more in-depth
text.  This could, perhaps, explain the situation to some extent?

The BSD Certification Group (bsdcertification.org) has a BSD Associate's
Courseware DVD which contains Project docs, Lehey's book, and more.  A
collaborative effort to write a book/study guide has been online at
bsdwiki.reedmedia.net.  I don't believe we met our deadlines, but I assume
that it's still a valid WIP.

Finally, check out the thread "Is FreeBSD simple enough for Novices, 
Will FreeBSD accept Office 98 + Publisher" currently ending on questions at .
Ted Mittelstaedt (author of "The FreeBSD Corporate Networker's Guide",
published by Addison-Wesley) gives an analysis that might also help to 
explain the "dearth of FreeBSD books by various publishers" in the last post.

HTH,

Kevin Kinsey
-- 
Surprise due today.  Also the rent.