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No bullshit guide to math and physics
11–20 of 160 posts
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#12I would buy it, but it appears you don't have an ebook version? I can't really keep physical books because they take up too much space (small apartment).
As a high school student with final math exams coming up soon, large gaps in my mathematical knowledge and a bunch of useless textbooks, I went for the "buy now" button just after reading the "I will teach you everything you need to know about equations, functions, vectors, limits, derivatives, integrals, forces, accelerations and optics" tagline.
Then I saw that there is no e-book option. It's 2013. Get with the times.
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#13I actually clicked "Buy Now" before I realized this was a physical textbook and cancelled. To me, it's almost inexcusable to market this sort of text to this type of audience and not have a digital copy. Shouldn't the barriers to entry be much lower for the author to get this out electronically? I see that the author is responding to comments here, so if you're like me and will buy it if it comes out electronically,…
I have the PDF version ready and will setup a shopping cart (ejunkie?) very soon (like tonight) because several people asked for this.
Reading math in print is really good: you can flip back and forth through the pages.
How much should the PDF cost? 29$ sounds a bit steep for a PDF no?
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#14The website isn't readable in IE9.
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#15I actually clicked "Buy Now" before I realized this was a physical textbook and cancelled. To me, it's almost inexcusable to market this sort of text to this type of audience and not have a digital copy. Shouldn't the barriers to entry be much lower for the author to get this out electronically? I see that the author is responding to comments here, so if you're like me and will buy it if it comes out electronically,…
I have the PDF version ready and will setup a shopping cart (ejunkie?) very soon (like tonight) because several people asked for this. Reading math in print is really good: you can flip back and forth through the pages. How much should the PDF cost? 29$ sounds a bit steep for a PDF no?
Shouldn't it be cheaper because it's an ebook? Free to distribute and higher profit margins.
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#16I would buy it, but it appears you don't have an ebook version? I can't really keep physical books because they take up too much space (small apartment).
@cameronh90 @veeti @Who828 I hear you guys.
I will have the PDF version ready by later tonight. How much should the PDF cost? Is a DRM-free PDF good enough or should I do the .epub format?
(in the meantime, check out the free preview: http://cnd.mcgill.ca/~ivan/miniref/miniref_v3_preview.pdf about one third of the book is there)
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#17From the example it looks like he doesn't connect the graphical answer to the calculus answer or to the obvious answer. I really hope he actually explains it in the book, because physicists are notoriously bad at being mathematically correct.
Thx for the feedback. I am just added the following paragraph to clarify. It is important to see the connections between the three different ways of finding the answer: the intuitive notion of download speed that we are all familiar with, the graphical notion of slope and the more abstract calculus notion of function derivative.
I meant that I hope you explain elsewhere in the book why these notions are related. Too often in physics people just accept how things work out without understanding why mathematically. For instance, the whole point of introducing limits is to make the "obvious/graphical" answer of "download speed" rigorous, but students rarely make that connection regardless of how many times the professor or textbook reiterates it (most likely because they don't read the textbook or go to class to begin with).
Do you in your book mention that calculating the exact download speed is impossible (and why this is the case)? Do you mention that the download speed one sees in their web browser is an approximation via a limit? These are the kind of important connections that get lost in the bullshit and the calculations.
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#18If you make this promising book available in eBook format you are guaranteed at least a few sales from HN readers, and indeed very likely from many other readers who prefer digital books over paper books.
I would advise that you make the digital copy of the book available as soon as possible—I am an interested buyer as well.
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#19I actually clicked "Buy Now" before I realized this was a physical textbook and cancelled. To me, it's almost inexcusable to market this sort of text to this type of audience and not have a digital copy. Shouldn't the barriers to entry be much lower for the author to get this out electronically? I see that the author is responding to comments here, so if you're like me and will buy it if it comes out electronically,…
I have the PDF version ready and will setup a shopping cart (ejunkie?) very soon (like tonight) because several people asked for this. Reading math in print is really good: you can flip back and forth through the pages. How much should the PDF cost? 29$ sounds a bit steep for a PDF no?
You don't need to pay for a physical copy, so it would make more sense to charge so you get the same profit from each, or maybe a bit less.
Re: No bullshit guide to math and physics
#20I actually clicked "Buy Now" before I realized this was a physical textbook and cancelled. To me, it's almost inexcusable to market this sort of text to this type of audience and not have a digital copy. Shouldn't the barriers to entry be much lower for the author to get this out electronically? I see that the author is responding to comments here, so if you're like me and will buy it if it comes out electronically,…
I have the PDF version ready and will setup a shopping cart (ejunkie?) very soon (like tonight) because several people asked for this. Reading math in print is really good: you can flip back and forth through the pages. How much should the PDF cost? 29$ sounds a bit steep for a PDF no?
Assuming you're interested in even compensating yourself for the time you're spending on this, I wouldn't go too low. Maybe base price of $19, and free when you order the physical book? That would still give you some wiggle room to do sales and give discounts to people who ask. Many people will happily pay that much, and if you were to go as low as, say, $9 (closer to 8 after transaction fees), that's really not that much, and you'll need to sell a lot to really make money and be able to keep doing this.