[Axiom-developer] Re: Axiom Book

[root]

CY,

> Just had a couple curosity questions for you concerning the Axiom
> book/manual.  
> 
> a)  I was wondering if there is some way for the book to take advantage
> of thinks like hyperlinking when producing a pdf?  I am able to use
> LaTeX + pdflatex to do this in the Maxima book but the Axiom book build
> seems to be integrated with the overall system build, so I'm not quite
> sure how to customize it.

Hyperlinks would be fine. I believe ADVI also supports hyperlinks.
The book.pamphlet file needs very little from the system in order
to build. This was part of the plan as you should be able to use
the book without having the system around. So it should be possible
to add 
\usepackage{hyper}
(or whatever hyperlinking package you have) and add hyperlinks.
If they were done in a way that didn't break the display of the
book under such tools as xdvi then I'd be happy to include any
hyperlinks you develop. Send me the changes and I'll try to 
incorporate them.

I'm a little concerned about pdf files, mostly because I haven't had
much luck getting the book properly formatted. My pdfs are fuzzy and
lack graphics.  Perhaps you will have more luck. I tend to stop at the
.dvi file.

David Mentre has done a pdf version.

I still have to return to working on the book as the graphics are
missing, the chapters need changes, and the appendix is broken. Just
this week, while working on the second book, I figured out how to use
pstricks, which was suggested to me much earlier but I haven't gotten
to it until now.

> 
> b)  Is there any progress on plans to have someone like O'Reilly to
> publish a hard copy of the book?  Online pdfs are good for a quick
> check of something, but I know I for one would shell out a few $$ (once
> I get some anyway) to have a bound paper copy.  Did anybody ever
> contact Oreilly to see if they might be interested?

The book already exists in a much better version. 

Jenks, Richard D., Sutor Robert S. 
Axiom -- The Scientific Computation System
ISBN 0-387-97855-0
ISBN 3-540-97855-0

Search for it on amazon, using the keywords "Axiom Jenks".
It is about 1/2 price on the used list. And, no, I don't 
get royalties :-)

I'd love for O'Reilly or Baen or Dover to publish it but that's
yet another hill to climb. I've tried to publish two textbooks
before and it's a lot more effort than it would seem. There is
no such thing as a simple job.

However, anyone on the list is free and welcome to try to publish
it. The book text is covered by the modified BSD license that NAG
used to release the sources. The additional words I've written are
also under the same license. So anyone with a touch of ambition is
free to take it, put their name on the cover, and publish it. I'd
even be willing to help but I can't take the lead in the effort.
I've got way too many things that are "top of stack" right now.

Tim