[Sotff] More regular and up-to-date PDF rendering...

[Brad Murray]

On Fri, Jan 30, 2009 at 12:23 AM, Joe Yeti <joeyeti at googlemail.com> wrote:
> Thx for that! It really is my cup of coffee!

I love to hear that and variations on it. :D Thanks Joe!

> Therefore Diaspora immediately hit the right spot, because it reminds
> me a bit of Burning Empires with their World Burning (thought they
> have indeed many more options, which are of course tied to the
> Infection Mechanics). I have not yet read the Ship Creation, but look
> forward to it also.

You are correct that these games influenced us to some degree or
another (I think I'm actually the only author on the team that's read
Burning Empires, but it's influenced a LOT of what I do even though
I've never actually played it all the way through).

> I could assist with keeping a PDF of the content of the Diaspora Wiki
> up-to-date, say each week. This would mean that I would review changes
> for the past week, change the appropriate parts of the PDF, render it
> and upload it somewhere. As the latest existing one is from December,
> there is a lot of new information out there as I saw. As the layout in
> your PDF is essentialy quite straightforward, that would not be a big
> job.

Well here's where we're at (and we're past due for an update, so hello
to everyone: here's where we're at):

Diaspora the game is very close to complete as a body of written work.
The playtest PDF that's up there reflects out of date material and
there are no plans to update it now because it's no longer a useful
tool for us (and that's probably important for everyone tracking this
project to keep in mind: that wiki is fundamentally a collaborative
design tool that the Diaspora team uses to work; we happen to think it
should also be public). The wiki material under the Book section has
been flattened as much as possible: if you want to print Diaspora in
its latest incarnation, your best bet is to click each link, choose
the print-friendly button on the wiki page, and print it. That's what
we do. This will give you a linear document that is complete and up to
date.

Our next step in the project is to begin typesetting the book. We plan
to release a portion (a playable portion) of that work as a PDF for
free. We have not determined what will happen with the wiki material
though, as it too will pass out of date as we typeset, I'm not
convinced there's any commercial burden to leaving it there.

Once the typeset is complete we will be going to print and finding
distributors. We plan to make the book available for sale in at least
one online location (IPR if they will have us) and we plan to make a
PDF of the book available for rather cheaper at at least one online
location. We intend to make these inexpensive but not free. The book
is going to be hardcover 6x9 so it sits on the shelf beside my copy of
SotC most elegantly. It will have an ISBN and be in "Books in Print"
and that sort of thing.

So, while your offer is generous, Joe, not much is going to change on
the wiki as we go forward and our attention is now focused on the
practicalities of making a book that's worth buying, so a regular
creation of a PDF is probably not something we need at this time. Most
new edits will be to the private typeset document that is just now
starting, though if we did the design part right then these will be
only cosmetic and organizational.

-- 
Brad Murray (halfjack)

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