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I was the project lead on this, which involved converting the Feynman Lectures from LaTeX to HTML. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Update : Most of the questions center on cost. I've answered in more detail below, but the short version is simple: no off-the-shelf converter was remotely sufficient for our needs, so we had to write lots of custom software, and writing custom software is hard.
Have they finally updated the lectures to use SI units?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Trevyn, above, mentioned, > The conversion from LaTeX to HTML was expensive: we raised considerable funds, but ran out before finishing Volumes II and III, so we are only posting Volume I initially. I don't know too much about digitalisation, but why does it cost so much?
The LaTeX source of the Lectures is long and heavily formatted, so the conversion to HTML involved writing a large amount of custom software, including lots of tests to catch regressions. In other words, this was a speculative software project; as anyone who has experience with such projects can tell you, it is virtually impossible to anticipate all the problems you'll run into. (The costs would have been even higher…
I was the project lead on this, which involved converting the Feynman Lectures from LaTeX to HTML. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Update : Most of the questions center on cost. I've answered in more detail below, but the short version is simple: no off-the-shelf converter was remotely sufficient for our needs, so we had to write lots of custom software, and writing custom software is hard.
One obvious question: why not use crowd funding to pay for finishing converting volume II and III?
Is the material going to be available in some format suitable for Kindle? Or do I need to convert the HTML myself?
I'm really hoping that we can get the original LaTeX someday - the conversion possibilities from that are endless.
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That is just sad. Why do you think most people get nothing out of art? Do you not consider Bach's fugas art? Or the Brothers of Karamazov? Or the statue of Nefertiti? I suppose you must mean that most people do not get an immediate material benefit out of art. But there is so much more in life than that.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The LaTeX source of the Lectures is long and heavily formatted, so the conversion to HTML involved writing a large amount of custom software, including lots of tests to catch regressions. In other words, this was a speculative software project; as anyone who has experience with such projects can tell you, it is virtually impossible to anticipate all the problems you'll run into. (The costs would have been even higher…
I am very grateful for your work, and I hate to pick on details, but surely you reused much of what's already available for LaTeX? I hope you didn't spend much of your time reinventing the wheel. I freely admit that I am probably vastly underestimating the amount of work that went into this, reuse or no.
Unfortunately, there's a vast gulf between "kinda-sorta mostly converted"—which is the best you can get with off-the-shelf converters—and "a faithful representation of the Feynman Lectures". Closing this gap required a large amount of gruesome work.
I was the project lead on this, which involved converting the Feynman Lectures from LaTeX to HTML. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Update : Most of the questions center on cost. I've answered in more detail below, but the short version is simple: no off-the-shelf converter was remotely sufficient for our needs, so we had to write lots of custom software, and writing custom software is hard.
I was the project lead on this, which involved converting the Feynman Lectures from LaTeX to HTML. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Update : Most of the questions center on cost. I've answered in more detail below, but the short version is simple: no off-the-shelf converter was remotely sufficient for our needs, so we had to write lots of custom software, and writing custom software is hard.
Have you thought about putting the source and scripts into a github repo, and taking community contributions? I'm sure people would pitch in to get later volumes converted.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Trevyn, above, mentioned, > The conversion from LaTeX to HTML was expensive: we raised considerable funds, but ran out before finishing Volumes II and III, so we are only posting Volume I initially. I don't know too much about digitalisation, but why does it cost so much?
This was one of my first thoughts; I know it's oversimplifying it by a wide margin, but there is a latex2html program in existence.