Please check out http://uptodate.oreilly.com/ for more details about the program itself. Let me know if there's something you would like clarified.

What is the page size? I'm curious about how much trimming will be involved when/if we print the updates.

This post has been edited by Al Gonzalez: Mar 10 2008, 07:28 AM

Great question Al.

The page size is 7x9, just like most of our books. So, if you print out the updates on 8.5x11 (or A4) paper, you will have to trim them to fit.

But the good news is that we are working on including blank sheets of 7x9 paper in the original binder. This means you could just take a chunk of paper out and feed it through your printer, flip it over to print on the other side, and fill your binder will the update.

Thank you!
Laurel

Great idea however the empty sheets you included in the book are bound together, so how are we supposed to put this in our printer?

Great idea, poor implementation.

--Mike.

Mike-
You must have gotten a copy at MIX We heard the same feedback from a number of people at MIX and are working to change this now. We realized that it would be much easier for you to print updates by using those blank pages (more useful than a blank notebook too!), so the next release of books will have blank loose leaf pages instead of a bound notebook.

Also, if you got your book at MIX, please make sure you register so we can send you some of those blank pages to print the new update on! I've also heard there was a fairly easy hack to loosen the binding and pry the pages out...but I'll have to try it myself before I advocate it here.

I appreciate your feedback and hope that this change will make the Up-to-Date experience better for everyone.
Laurel

I just received my order, Silverlight 2 Up-to-date, from Amazon. I noticed that the loose-leaf blank pages have their binder holes drilled more shallow to the edge of the page than the printed pages. This means that that they hang a few millimeters over the printed pages. Is this intentional or a printing/binding issue?

Thanks,
Ray Williams

Hi Ray-
Sadly, this was part of our manufacturing delay.

The book started out with a bound notebook, but after some very good feedback ("Hey, why don't you make this looseleaf so I can print on it? I don't need another notebook.) that's exactly what we did. But we already had all the notebooks printed, so we had the manufacturer slice off the binding and reinsert the pages as looseleaf.

You shouldn't have any problem printing the update to these pages.

Thank you,
Laurel

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There is 2 issues I have found

1) As already stated the pre-punched sheets hang about an 1/8 of an inch over the edge. This makes it really hard to flip the pages and whole sections (the shorter pages between the update pages) can be missed.

2) The top and bottom holes are not the same distance from the edge of the page. Therefore if you do not put the paper in the printer exactly right way the pages hang about an 1/8 of an inch over the bottom.. The frustrating thing is that I did not realize this until I had printed the first update and went to insert it into the binder.

3) The PDF images in the update are lighter and have a light grey with greenish tint color when printed. These look totally different form the images in the original released pages.

IMO these three things make the book look very unprofessional looking. And for programmers who are perfectionist (which most programmer are) these things can drive us crazy. I think these issues can be easily fixed by doing one simple thing. When the book is finally released, provide one cumulative PDF that has all the updated pages that are in the released book. The those that want to can download the officially release PDF and reprint all the pages so that they all line up the same (takes care of #1 and #2) and all the pages are printed on the same printer (takes care of #3).This allows everyone who brought the book to have the option of reprinting all the pages so our final copy of the book looks professional and easy to flip through.
I would not offer a pre-printed version of this PDF and make it only available in PDF format to keep the cost down of creating this "Offically Release Cumulative Update"

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Also, is there the possibility of making packages of the pre-punched paper available (maybe packages of 200, 300 pages that we can buy. I just printed out the 1st update and used over 1/2 the blank pre-punched pages that came with the book. It would even be petter if these prepackaged pages could be the standard A4 size to make them easier to print and more standardized.

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Thanks,



This post has been edited by smehaffie: May 24 2008, 05:49 PM

Hello smehaffie-
These are all valid and excellent observations. I can assure you that we are really looking forward to making the next Up-to-Date book even better. We thought about making pre-punched paper available for purchase, but I'm glad you also think that would be a viable option.

Thank you,
Laurel

Thanks Laurel, IMO the following 2 things need to be done for this up-to-date book and all future one.

1) Make pre-punched paper available for purchase: The ones that come with the book are not enough and printing them out on 8x11 paper and cutting is not really a good option. I tried it and when I tried cutting the pages and it was not an easy thing to do and very time consuming. Being able to buy prepunched paper for these books is a necessity. I would not have any problems paying for extra pre-punched paper to use for printing the updates. Please make this available soon, since after the next update I will probably be out of paper (and might not even have enough for the next update) and really need this.

2) Have one final update that merges all previous updates that is only available pre-printed. This is for users who have printed out the updates so that they have them, but they wan to get professionsally printed versions once the book is released. This would be a way to save your customers money since they could buy one update plus shipping instead of each seperate update at $4.00 each (3 updates = $12.00, 4 updates = $16.00, etc) plus shipping. I already paid $34.99 for the book so I would rather not pay a whole bunch more to get all the updates pre-printed.

3) An option for #2 would be to offer a special once the book is released, so that those that brought it early can buy the pre-printed updateds for one low price plus shipping (50%-75% off buying them individually).

Example 50%: 3 updates = $6.00 insted of $12.00, 5 update = $10.00 instead of $20.00
Example 75%: 3 updates = $3.00 insted of $12.00, 5 update = $5.00 instead of $20.00