O’Reilly Network Safari Bookshelf: This is part of Safari Online, of which I’m a member and big fan.
Sometimes you just can’t wait for the book. When you need to learn a new technology right now, turn to the Rough Cuts service from Safari Books Online. You’ll get early access to books on cutting-edge technologies-you can literally read them as they’re being written.
It’s essentially a look into the “beta” versions of books. The authors of “Agile Development with Rails” did this with their book — I paid a fee for the pre-production PDF, and got the actual book when it shipped. They did this to pre-sell copies, but they ended up getting over 100 corrections from readers.
Look at these titles:
This very well may be the future of technical book publishing. Beta periods are a good thing.
Great Design: What is Design? (First Draft): Here's a great rant from Spolsky about what makes good design and how hard it is to get there. He has a great bit in the middle about the conflicts present when deciding whether or not to put a mute button on a phone.…