Note to Participants

What’s this all about?

My objective for this blog is to create an environment where I can develop this book with your input during the writing process. My motives are two-fold:

1. To get input from people who know more than I do
2. To insure that I have continuous pressure to make progress

My commitment to participants is to acknowledge your input in the book (unless you choose not to be credited), and to post new sections to the blog at least once a week (more frequently if I can).  (Update 29 Feb 2008:  the once a week frequency has slowed down, but I am continuing to write steadily and will continue to post material).

Getting Started

If you’ve run across this blog for the first time, you’re starting in the right place. Once you’ve checked out this page, take a look at the outline first. You’ll find that it has pointers to each of the sections that have been posted so far. You can also find a list of the pages that have been posted so far in the right hand column under the heading Pages. The sections there are not in exactly the right order, but they are all there.

Guidelines for comments

• Any comments are welcome, though I reserve the right to remove inappropriate comments and spam (critical comments are not inappropriate; fire away).
• Use the “Leave a Comment” block at the bottom of the page (sometimes you need to click on the link that says how many comments there are to get to the comment form).
• I’m moderating comments, so your comment won’t appear immediately on the site; but I’ll get to it as quickly as I can.
• If you want to make a private comment, say so right at the top and I won’t release it to the site.
• For early drafts, don’t spend time copy-editing. While I appreciate all the help I can get, I don’t want you to waste your time on things that will surely change in subsequent drafts.