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Beautiful Racket v1.0

beautifulracket.com

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Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#51

Post by michaelmrose »

throwaway399 wrote: post #14
jolux wrote: post #2

I'd just like to say that I admire Matthew Butterick's creative experimentation with business models for web publishing and absolutely adore Practical Typography to the extent that I've purchased several of his fonts and intend to purchase Beautiful Racket as well. It can be hard to imagine that there's a world for type design on computers outside the formulaic mundanity and advertisement-laden nature of the rest of…

I don't know. It looks non-functional and ugly to me. https://i.imgur.com/DmPKqhM.png This is in contrast to something like nytimes.com which is really well designed.

Is that huge ugly black box the result of not loading images or a defect in your browser?

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#52

Post by gradschool »

I'm no marketing guy so please excuse what may be some naive questions prompted by his how-to-pay page. I gather that tiered pricing is considered good practice, but how effective is it to use a jokey, edgy and possibly sarcastic or insulting tone when explaining the rationale? Does it not undermine his professional credibility, or is there some new trend in this area that I'm unaware of?

Is it a good idea to tell people how much to pay based on how much you think they should be able to afford, or is it better to let them decide for themselves with just a little subtle help? I'm thinking of how Apple sells iDevices at several price points separated by big increments for small increases in memory rather than directly asking people how rich they are.

On a related note, if you were in charge of a budget for acquiring books on behalf of an organization, would you be able to justify spending any of it on a web published book like this one with no hard copy? Would it raise any eyebrows to opt for a higher price tier with exactly the same offering as a lower one?

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#54

Post by throwaway399 »

coldtea wrote: post #26
throwaway399 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know. It looks non-functional and ugly to me. https://i.imgur.com/DmPKqhM.png This is in contrast to something like nytimes.com which is really well designed.

> It looks non-functional and ugly to me. Non-functional and ugly? I'd say this is subjective, but I find this assessment objectively wrong. It's complete accessible, and totally functional for what it does -- present a series of sections and display code examples. And it's also quite obviously well designed from an aesthetic perspective. (There's no black box in the actual site in Chrome, but even with the black box…

I was responding to a post about design, so this reply was about design.

Yeah, it's a subjective opinion. Something looking good is also an opinion.

What I mean by non-functional is that the attempt at design was non-functional on my browser resulting in dead space and unattractive design.

Since this book is about programming, it already sets a precedent for potentially pretty but non-universally-working solutions. Something I personally try to avoid as much as possible.

Other issues with the design is huge unattractive margins and the main page containing almost no information when first loaded.

Honestly, this all wouldn't normally bother me as there are tons of books whose online sites have OK at best design. And maybe it's a great book, but complimenting it on design specifically seems wrong.

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#55

Post by drumttocs8 »

rtpg wrote: post #6
jolux wrote: post #2

I'd just like to say that I admire Matthew Butterick's creative experimentation with business models for web publishing and absolutely adore Practical Typography to the extent that I've purchased several of his fonts and intend to purchase Beautiful Racket as well. It can be hard to imagine that there's a world for type design on computers outside the formulaic mundanity and advertisement-laden nature of the rest of…

It would be nice for there to be a bit more institutional knowledge on how to get people to pay for your product among these experiments. Too many times I see projects say they're not making much money from these sorts of efforts, but when I go to the project I can't even figure out how to give them money! LWN is a prime example of lost opportunities (count how many steps it takes to go from "see subscriber link" to…

Maybe I'm naive, but I doubt specifically saying "don't pay me just $5" will increase his ability to make money. I do enjoy his snarky tone, but seriously, telling people to either pay $39 or just use it for free doesn't make much sense at all.

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#56

Post by e12e »

Pxtl wrote: post #47
e12e wrote: post #24

Looks like an interesting book. And, on my surface pro, it's pretty. It's not very readable, as it is only dark-on-light, high contrast -- I prefer "night mode" for reading long-form. And it's unreadable on my Android device (both Firefox and Chrome), due not being a responsive design - the text is simply too small to read. For comparison I've read a handful of books on my Android - both epub and Kindle. A minimal te…

Maybe I have unnaturally good eyes, but I got through the first example on my dinky little Moto G2. Didn't seem too small to read for me.

Actually, turns out the actual chapters have the opposite problem: Too big text, with too big margins and a ragged right that makes it legible, but unreadable. The front page is still too tiny to read...

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#57

Post by simonh »

Veen wrote: post #31
simonh wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only readable on my iPhone because it's a 6+, on anything smaller it would be infuriating and it's not ideal for me anyway. Not only that but in 'reader mode' the formatting is completely wrecked such the the content actually disappears. This is all a shame because my preferred way to read something like this is on a mobile device, although I suppose it could be semi-deliberate to nudge you towards buying. Edit:…

For some reason, Butterick is averse to both making a PDF available and to responsive design. Perhaps — as a typographer and book designer — he prefers to control how the layout looks even if it means it looks bad on smaller screens. From the FAQ: * Will you ever release this book as a PDF or e-book? No. * Do you plan to opti­mize this book for mobile? No.

So he cares deeply about making the book oook beautiful for a specific arbitrary subset of people and doesn't give a crap about that for the set of people that happens to include me. Nice to know.

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#58

Post by coldtea »

throwaway399 wrote: post #54
coldtea wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It looks non-functional and ugly to me. Non-functional and ugly? I'd say this is subjective, but I find this assessment objectively wrong. It's complete accessible, and totally functional for what it does -- present a series of sections and display code examples. And it's also quite obviously well designed from an aesthetic perspective. (There's no black box in the actual site in Chrome, but even with the black box…

I was responding to a post about design, so this reply was about design. Yeah, it's a subjective opinion. Something looking good is also an opinion. What I mean by non-functional is that the attempt at design was non-functional on my browser resulting in dead space and unattractive design. Since this book is about programming, it already sets a precedent for potentially pretty but non-universally-working solutions. S…

>Other issues with the design is huge unattractive margins and the main page containing almost no information when first loaded.

"Huge unattractive margins", or use of ample "negative space", has long been a staple of the design vocabulary. Nothing inherently unattractive about it.

If what you want to say fits in a small space, don't make it take over the screen, and don't try to cram every level of information on a single page.

And it's the opposite of the overly busy, migraine inducing NYT website you mentioned as a good example of web design.

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#59

Post by Veen »

simonh wrote: post #57
Veen wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some reason, Butterick is averse to both making a PDF available and to responsive design. Perhaps — as a typographer and book designer — he prefers to control how the layout looks even if it means it looks bad on smaller screens. From the FAQ: * Will you ever release this book as a PDF or e-book? No. * Do you plan to opti­mize this book for mobile? No.

So he cares deeply about making the book oook beautiful for a specific arbitrary subset of people and doesn't give a crap about that for the set of people that happens to include me. Nice to know.

I don't think the "arbitrary" is justified. It's a group of people who use a platform over which a reasonable amount control over typography and layout can be maintained.

That's not arbitrary if your goal is to create books that conform to a particular standard.

(it's also possible there are technical reasons. The book is written in Pollen, Butterick's publishing system for web-based books. I don't believe it supports output to other formats.)

Re: Beautiful Racket v1.0

#60

Post by FigmentEngine »

tremendo wrote: post #16
untangle wrote: post #4

Cool. I'm always game for a good discussion of DSL's and Lisp (Racket). But what struck me immediately was the quality of the "Why Lisp Why Racket" essay. This is probably the most compelling that I've seen as it gets specific and cites near-term benefits – not just the elitist "it's good for you" or "it'll make you smarter" stuff. Nicely done.

Thanks for recommending that essay. Reading through it I found myself first agreeing, every other attempt sings about Lisp's wonders without showing you the what/why/how, only woo. Then, here I was halfway through this essay also not yet knowing what the fuzz is about, and when the author finally gets around to it I end up not really sold on it. I have given Racket and CL my time before only to end giving up, not hav…

this really explains why lisp http://www.defmacro.org/ramblings/lisp.html
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