Yii 1.1 Application Development Cookbook, final version and process
Here is my English-language collection of recipes on the Yii framework.
First, I will tell you a little about the book, and then I will try to describe the process of its creation.
')
The book turned out quite voluminous, already 392 pages. And all on the case;) Recipes are divided into 13 chapters. You can read both in order and each recipe separately. Describes the "hidden" features of Yii, using the kernel, creating extensible portable code, TDD, and many more useful topics.
Yes, you should immediately warn that the book is not for beginners. Make at least one application on Yii before reading necessarily.
The book has its own website, http://yiicookbook.org/ , where you can see a more detailed description, table of contents, read the introduction of Qiang Xue, the main developer of the framework, and also find links to the pages of the book on the publisher's website and on amazon.
Work on the book began in early October 2010. The process was very difficult.
A total of 16 people worked on the book: I, the coordinators, reviewers, the editor, the editors, the designer, the web designers, and even the photographer who worked on the cover picture.
It all starts with a plan: we list all the recipes that I want to describe, in a few words we describe what will be there inside. In my case, only one evening went to the initial version of the plan. It probably helped that I have the most direct relation to Yii.
After the publisher gives the go-ahead for the implementation, all items from the plan contain the estimated number of pages. Individual recipes are grouped into chapters. Unnecessary, potentially boring and not interesting is discarded.
After the plan is fully agreed, the contract is signed and the process of creating drafts begins. It begins, oddly enough, not with the writing of the text itself, but with an introduction to the rather voluminous documentation on the design and format.
As I actually write books, I didn’t even suspect and at first I tried to immediately produce the perfect text. It took a lot of time and effort to write the first chapters (the very first one was written about a month), but the result wasn’t pleasing anyway the first time. Having handed over half of the chapters, I realized that I need to write everything that comes to mind. Even if it does not seem exactly what should be in the book. When there is material, although there is something to work with: after all the planned moments are described, the process of re-reading and editing begins. So it goes much faster and better.
Yes, for each chapter you need to attach all the code that is used in it. It is better to do it right in the course of writing. Later it will be very little time.
At this stage, the first six drafts were posted electronically using the PACKT RAW program. That is completely raw and unprocessed. Oddly enough, feedback from the first readers was generally positive, which gave additional strength.
As soon as the drafts are ready, reviewers come into the picture. As a rule, these are people familiar with the subject. They try to repeat everything described in the book and strongly criticize everything that is not working and incomprehensible. As soon as I finished with the last draft, it was necessary to start fixing the found and finalizing it. Some of the recipes from the first chapters had to be rewritten altogether.
In addition to the official reviewers of the publishing house, some members of the Russian-speaking community and the Yii core team did not quite officially take part in the process, for which a special thank you to them. Their criticism was particularly important.
At about the same time, a list of the software used in the book (in our case, the Yii toolbox, testing tools, the DBMS) is compiledauto author biography, thanks and introduction.
After the edits are completed, the maker-ups begin to work. The author temporarily cease to bother. In my case, the lull lasted a whole month. There was even a feeling that everything ... here it is! Finally! But no, that's not all. A break is definitely worth taking to relax as well as possible. I used part of the free time to create a website for a book. In general, such sites are made very rarely and exclusively by the authors. I was inspired by this act http://phpsecurity.org/ (by the way, a wonderful book).
As it turned out, while the author is resting, not only the coder, but also the editors work: the language and various errors that are not caught the eye of reviewers are corrected. PDFs are regularly sent to the author, which should be carefully studied and lists of errors and corrections should be compiled. This is the last chance to influence the final result. The search for errors, as it turned out, is very difficult. Especially when everyone wants to release a book a month earlier than the originally announced period.
As soon as the author sends a feedback through the last chapter and the final edits are made, the final electronic version appears on the publisher's website. Well and, most likely, the printing house starts to work.
Here is the process from the point of view of the author.
First, I will tell you a little about the book, and then I will try to describe the process of its creation.
')
The book turned out quite voluminous, already 392 pages. And all on the case;) Recipes are divided into 13 chapters. You can read both in order and each recipe separately. Describes the "hidden" features of Yii, using the kernel, creating extensible portable code, TDD, and many more useful topics.
Yes, you should immediately warn that the book is not for beginners. Make at least one application on Yii before reading necessarily.
The book has its own website, http://yiicookbook.org/ , where you can see a more detailed description, table of contents, read the introduction of Qiang Xue, the main developer of the framework, and also find links to the pages of the book on the publisher's website and on amazon.
Work on the book began in early October 2010. The process was very difficult.
A total of 16 people worked on the book: I, the coordinators, reviewers, the editor, the editors, the designer, the web designers, and even the photographer who worked on the cover picture.
It all starts with a plan: we list all the recipes that I want to describe, in a few words we describe what will be there inside. In my case, only one evening went to the initial version of the plan. It probably helped that I have the most direct relation to Yii.
After the publisher gives the go-ahead for the implementation, all items from the plan contain the estimated number of pages. Individual recipes are grouped into chapters. Unnecessary, potentially boring and not interesting is discarded.
After the plan is fully agreed, the contract is signed and the process of creating drafts begins. It begins, oddly enough, not with the writing of the text itself, but with an introduction to the rather voluminous documentation on the design and format.
As I actually write books, I didn’t even suspect and at first I tried to immediately produce the perfect text. It took a lot of time and effort to write the first chapters (the very first one was written about a month), but the result wasn’t pleasing anyway the first time. Having handed over half of the chapters, I realized that I need to write everything that comes to mind. Even if it does not seem exactly what should be in the book. When there is material, although there is something to work with: after all the planned moments are described, the process of re-reading and editing begins. So it goes much faster and better.
Yes, for each chapter you need to attach all the code that is used in it. It is better to do it right in the course of writing. Later it will be very little time.
At this stage, the first six drafts were posted electronically using the PACKT RAW program. That is completely raw and unprocessed. Oddly enough, feedback from the first readers was generally positive, which gave additional strength.
As soon as the drafts are ready, reviewers come into the picture. As a rule, these are people familiar with the subject. They try to repeat everything described in the book and strongly criticize everything that is not working and incomprehensible. As soon as I finished with the last draft, it was necessary to start fixing the found and finalizing it. Some of the recipes from the first chapters had to be rewritten altogether.
In addition to the official reviewers of the publishing house, some members of the Russian-speaking community and the Yii core team did not quite officially take part in the process, for which a special thank you to them. Their criticism was particularly important.
At about the same time, a list of the software used in the book (in our case, the Yii toolbox, testing tools, the DBMS) is compiled
After the edits are completed, the maker-ups begin to work. The author temporarily cease to bother. In my case, the lull lasted a whole month. There was even a feeling that everything ... here it is! Finally! But no, that's not all. A break is definitely worth taking to relax as well as possible. I used part of the free time to create a website for a book. In general, such sites are made very rarely and exclusively by the authors. I was inspired by this act http://phpsecurity.org/ (by the way, a wonderful book).
As it turned out, while the author is resting, not only the coder, but also the editors work: the language and various errors that are not caught the eye of reviewers are corrected. PDFs are regularly sent to the author, which should be carefully studied and lists of errors and corrections should be compiled. This is the last chance to influence the final result. The search for errors, as it turned out, is very difficult. Especially when everyone wants to release a book a month earlier than the originally announced period.
As soon as the author sends a feedback through the last chapter and the final edits are made, the final electronic version appears on the publisher's website. Well and, most likely, the printing house starts to work.
Here is the process from the point of view of the author.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/127106/
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