Re: GDL Guidebook : Help please !

[David Kastrup]

Mark <mark@nospam.com> writes:

> Hi, I have a personal project to write a guidebook for Project Management.
>
> I'd like to publish it under the GNU Free Documentation License.
>
> Has anyone already had an experience of this kind of thing - pitfalls
> to avoid, distribution, communication ?
>
> I've done a few Google searches, but I'm not finding anything that
> seems useful. Outside of GNU software handbooks, there doesn't seem to
> be a lot of other literature published with this license... Any links
> would be useful (I already found and read the fsf GDL pages).

Personally, I think the GFDL strikes a good balance between author's
interest of self-presentation and separate usefulness.  However, I
find it not particularly well-suited for accompanying free software in
machine-readable form (like Texinfo manuals usually are) since then
one would want to be able to move things around between manual and
software when updating either.

For books that are primarily intended for publishing and circulation
in paper form, however, I would probably prefer it to other options.

If you are reading comments about the GFDL, I recommend that you also
check whether those comments apply to the kind of distribution/use you
have in mind.  For example, a book like you have been envisioning
would likely not be intended for inclusion on free software CDs like
Debian, so whether or not you meet the Debian free software guidelines
is not much of a concern for you, except when _you_ are unhappy when a
_particular_ guideline is not met by your license.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum