[bookshare-discuss] Re: I Submitted My First Book
- From: "Evan Reese" <mentat1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 13:21:19 -0800
Thanks, Jake, I'll remember this about OpenBook for future reference. I'll
send up files in .rtf starting with my next submission. I just need to find
out how to eliminate those pesky blank lines with Word or even Wordpad so I can
edit the files on my Pac Mate. I don't want to be tied to my desktop editing
.ark files for hours and I doubt that FS-Edit has a function for doing this.
I'll be happy to be proved wrong, of course. I don't want to just scan a bunch
of stuff and dump it up there, I feel I need to read it through and fix it up
as best I can before sending it. In good old WordPerfect 5.1, it was a simple
matter of doing a search and replace, searching for multiple hard returns and
replacing them with one just by hitting the 'enter' key, but I doubt that it's
quite that straightforward in Word or Wordpad.
Thanks, again.
----- Original Message -----
From: Jake Brownell
To: bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Saturday, January 21, 2006 7:54 AM
Subject: [bookshare-discuss] Re: I Submitted My First Book
Hi Evan,
Congratulations on the first submission. Part of BookShare's appeal to
many is the ability to get books processed extremely quickly when books enter
the system. Sometimes of course this isn't the case, but in general the turn
around time isn't bad.
The information is a bit out dated on the website when it comes to
submitting and validating. The general preference in the volunteer community is
that files be submitted in RTF format. This will allow the most people to work
on the books. Everyone else's OpenBook will put blank lines in as well, its
just how the software works. Don't worry about it for submission purposes
because the BookShare automated processes will handle it.
It isn't a requirement that a volunteer read the entire book during the
validation stage, some choose to and some do not. For some it depends on the
quality of the book the submitter provides.
The BookShare team has been working on updated instructions on how to handle
many things in the submission/validation process, but the work has been slow,
because of the effort to make sure all information is up-to-date and accurate.
It can also be difficult for the staff to respond to every email sent to the
volunteer address.
Yes, the volunteer list can be a bit overbearing at times *grin* I've been on
there since summer of 2004 or so. Feel free to contact me offlist if you have
questions you don't feel comfortable asking on this discussion list.
HTH,
Jake
jabrown@xxxxxxxxx
----- Original Message -----
From: Evan Reese
To: bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Saturday, January 21, 2006 8:20 AM
Subject: [bookshare-discuss] I Submitted My First Book
For Science Fiction fans who liked the first two books in Alastair
Reynolds' Inhibitors story, _Revelation Space_ and _Redemption Ark_, I sent up
the third - and last, at least for now - installment _Absolution Gap_ on
Tuesday. Thursday morning I got an email telling me that the book had been
reviewed and accepted for publication on Bookshare. Sure enough, a search for
the author brought up the book. I checked this morning and it's on the New
Books list. Call me strange if you want to, but I got quite a thrill seeing
the book I submitted come up in the author search and the New Books list. Is
that a usual time for books to be validated? Doesn't someone have to read
through it to make sure it's ok? It's a 565-page hardcover that just barely
fit on the scanner. The .txt file was 1.5 megs - my OpenBook seems to put
blank lines between paragraphs when I try to save in .rtf format. (Anybody
know if this can be fixed?) I just finished reading this book literally the
day I joined bookshare, so I wasn't aware of the scanning preferences and
therefore I didn't have an .ark version saved.
NLS really dropped the ball on this one. They have _Revelation Space_ and
the related book _Chasm City_ on tape, but _Redemption Ark_ has been out for
three years and _Absolution Gap_ for two and they aren't even in process yet.
I have a bunch of other books, mainly Science and Science Fiction, that I
have scanned for my own reading pleasure over the years from Openbook and
previously from Oscar which I will be submitting in the near future.
I have several other questions about the validation process that I can't
seem to find answers for on the volunteer homepage faq, which seems a little
thin, and thequestions I've sent to the email address provided don't seem to
get a response. I've sent a few messages to it over the past week with no
response to any of them. How long does it generally take to get one?
I know about the volunteer mailing list, and I'm sure that all these
questions are better asked there, but 50 messages a day - the figure given on
the website - is more volume than I can handle on top of the other email I get.
Thanks for any enlightenment. This is my first message, so apologies for
any violations of conventions.
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