Wow! eBook – Blog

Book Description

As we move into an era of unprecedented volumes of data and computing power, the benefits aren’t for business alone. Data can help citizens access government, hold it accountable and build new services to help themselves.

Simply making data available is not sufficient. The use of data for the public good is being driven by a distributed community of media, nonprofits, academics and civic advocates.

This report from O’Reilly Radar highlights the principles of data in the public good, and surveys areas where data is already being used to great effect, covering:

• Consumer finance
• Transit data
• Government transparency
• Data journalism
• Aid and development
• Crisis and emergency response
• Healthcare

Table of Contents

• From Healthcare to Finance to Emergency Response, Data Holds Download Now »

Book Description

Although the digital revolution has made content available to more people than print books ever could, ebooks are still only as accessible as the foundation they’re built on—and all too often the foundation is weak. But that’s changing. With the introduction of EPUB 3, publishers now have the means to create a single rich data source for audiences of all reading abilities.

Through practical tips and examples, Accessible EPUB 3 takes you inside the EPUB 3 format and explores how you can enrich and enhance content for all readers. Author Matt Garrish demystifies the process of making content easier to access, demonstrating how accessible practices are intertwined with standard content best practices.

Among many techniques, this guide will teach you how to:

• Add structure and meaning to your publications to make them more usable by accessible technologies
• Tailor EPUB Navigation Documents for readers requiring either full or reduced navigation
• Create media overlays to synchronize human narration with text display
• Improve text-to-speech playback by adding SSML, PLS lexicons, and CSS3 Speech functionality

Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Introduction
Chapter 2. Building a Better EPUB: Fundamental Accessibility
Chapter 3. It’s Alive: Rich Content Accessibility Download Now »

Book Description

The Best of TOC New York 2012

The acceleration of change and innovation in the publishing industry today is dizzying, and the pace can be overwhelming. At O’Reilly’s TOC New York Conference in February 2012, practitioners and executives from the publishing and tech industries joined together to navigate the ongoing transformation. With this video compilation, you’ll get a seat in the front row of every session at this groundbreaking conference.

Watch stirring keynotes from luminaries such as LeVar Burton (RRKidz), Tim Carmody (Wired), and Judith Curr (Atria Books). Then take in practical and inspiring sessions in three tracks: Manage, Make, and Market. Download these videos or view them through our HD player, and learn about the innovations rocking every aspect of the art, craft, and business of publishing in the 21st century.

Here are just a few of the sessions you’ll receive in this video package:

Manage:

• Hippo in Ballet Shoes, Or Greyhound on the Track? Applying Agile Methodologies to Traditional Publishing—Kristen McLean (Bookigee)
• You’ve Decided The Cloud Is Right For Your Organization. Now the Hard Part—Jonathan Reichental (City of Palo Alto, California)
• Minimum Viable (Publishing) Product—Todd Sattersten (BizBookLab) Download Now »

Book Description

iBooks Author is the first tool of its kind. Never before have publishers, authors, and content creators had a tool for making dynamic, interactive ebooks in a WYSIWYG environment. This book is intended to get you up and writing in iBooks Author. You’ll learn what to expect from this new tool and what its strengths and limitations are. You’ll see how you can create beautifully designed pages and how you can bring those designs to life with interactive content in ways that, before now, were only possible in a web browser on the Internet. You’ll also find out how to navigate the occasionally tricky terrain of Apple’s ecosystem so that you can get your book published to the iBookstore.

Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Tour
Chapter 2. Book Building Basics
Chapter 3. Text
Chapter 4. Objects
Chapter 5. Layouts
Chapter 6. Publish Your Book

About the Author
Nellie McKesson is a production specialist at O’Reilly Media, where she focuses on ebook development and improved production processes while also overseeing book reprints and errata. She began as a print layout specialist with an expert knowledge of InDesign. Download Now »

Book Description

At last, here’s an approachable introduction to the widely used Portable Document Format. PDFs are everywhere, both online and in printed form, but few people take advantage of the useful features or grasp the nuances of this format. This concise book provides a hands-on tour of the world’s leading page-description language for programmers, power users, and professionals in the search, electronic publishing, and printing industries. Illustrated with lots of examples, this book is the documentation you need to fully understand PDF.

• Build a simple PDF file from scratch in a text editor
• Learn the layout and content of a PDF file, as well as the syntax of its objects
• Examine the logical structure of PDF objects, and learn how pages and their resources are arranged into a document
• Create vector graphics and raster images in PDF, and deal with transparency, color spaces, and patterns
• Explore PDF operators for building and showing text strings
• Get up to speed on bookmarks, metadata, hyperlinks, annotations, and file attachments
• Learn how encryption and document permissions work in PDF
• Use the pdftk program to process PDF files from the command line

Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Introduction
Chapter 2. Building a Simple PDF Download Now »

Book Description

Based on more than forty interviews with Jobs conducted over two years—as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues—Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the roller-coaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing.

At a time when America is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, and when societies around the world are trying to build digital-age economies, Jobs stands as the ultimate icon of inventiveness and applied imagination. He knew that the best way to create value in the twenty-first century was to connect creativity with technology. He built a company where leaps of the imagination were combined with remarkable feats of engineering.

Although Jobs cooperated with this book, he asked for no control over what was written nor even the right to read it before it was published. He put nothing off-limits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly. And Jobs speaks candidly, sometimes brutally so, about the people he worked with and competed against. His friends, foes, and colleagues provide an unvarnished view of the passions, perfectionism, obsessions, artistry, devilry, and compulsion for control that shaped his approach to business and the innovative products that resulted.

Driven by demons, Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. Download Now »