Re^2: Unwritten Perl Books: 2007 version

[brian_d_foy]

Mastering Perl has a chapter on tie. I think it's one of the longer chapters in the book.

One of my goals in Mastering Perl is to deal with some advanced topics, but also show the programmer that you're not going to be able to get a book on everything you want to do. At some point, you have to stop being merely a consumer and start integrating information on your own.

A book is too much for some of these topics. It's a waste of time for almost everyone involved because the sales are so little. I just spent a year and a half on Mastering Perl, and if the trail off from Learning Perl to Intermediate Perl continues to Mastering Perl, it means that I'll make almost no money from book sales for the tremendous amount of effort for the latest book. Other Perl books that would seem to have a larger natural audience don't even sell out their first printing. The potential market for advanced Perl books is large, but the actual market is pretty small. Lots of people claim to like books, but very few actually like to buy them. :)

O'Reilly and some other publishers have been experimenting with PDF-only publications, but that really only saves on the printing and distribution costs (which can be significant). It doesn't really save on author or editor time if they want to maintain the same level of quality. That is, it doesn't make it any more profitable for the author, the biggest limiting factor in the amount of information out there.

Better than books are directed articles for something like Perl.com, The Perl Review, or even a blog entry. I'd be happy to publish articles on most of the topics listed in this thread. Someone just has to write them.

Don't wait for other people to write articles though. Nothing gets done by waiting for the people who know the subject to explain it. Someone gets to step up, learn the subject, and write about it. It's a great way to learn new things.