Printed Documentation

[floob]

I have been searching for a way to print the official Python
documentation into some kind of book (for my own uses). I don't
really care if it's printed on newspaper and bound with elmer's
glue ... any way I can get relatively recent _official documentation_
in print form will do.

I'm on the go a lot, and can't read for long periods of time on LCD
screens anyhow (so having a laptop is not my solution). Until eBook
readers grow up a bit, I'm stuck trying to print the documentation
that I REALLY need to read and absorb.

Lulu.com is an option, but it would cost something around $100 US
before shipping to get everything printed. Also, I would have to
split up some larger documents into Volumes, which I'd rather not have
to do.

Has anyone tried this before? Is the documentation already available
in print?

Thanks,

drfloob

 

[excord80]

I have been searching for a way to print the official Python
documentation into some kind of book (for my own uses).  I don't
really care if it's printed on newspaper and bound with elmer's
glue ... any way I can get relatively recent _official documentation_
in print form will do.

I'm on the go a lot, and can't read for long periods of time on LCD
screens anyhow (so having a laptop is not my solution).  Until eBook
readers grow up a bit, I'm stuck trying to print the documentation
that I REALLY need to read and absorb.

Lulu.com is an option, but it would cost something around $100 US
before shipping to get everything printed.  Also, I would have to
split up some larger documents into Volumes, which I'd rather not have
to do.

Has anyone tried this before?  Is the documentation already available
in print?

Thanks,

drfloob

http://docs.python.org/download.html

I'd try taking the pdf to my local print shop and ask how much they'd
charge.

Local print shops have options for various bindings too.

 

[floob]

http://docs.python.org/download.html

I'd try taking the pdf to my local print shop and ask how much they'd
charge.

Local print shops have options for various bindings too.

I tried 7 print shops in my area. Five refused to print single-run
books (minimum quantity of 100). Of the 2 that WOULD print a single
set of books, the cheapest was $250.00 (spiral bound, no covers, 8.5"
x 11", cheapest paper available). That quote included roughly: the
tutorial, library, reference, distutils, extending, and c-api pdfs.

For that price, I could buy an eBook reader with plans to throw it
away when I was done!


Off on a bit of a tangent:
if the Python Software Foundation could strike a deal with a
charitable printing company, users could probably get a slight
discount on buying printed documentation, and I'd bet Python's
organization could get a small percentage of each sale. I believe
ubuntu is doing something like this with Lulu.com. It'd be nice to
support Python while doing something I was going to do on my own,
anyhow.

 

[excord80]

I tried 7 print shops in my area.  Five refused to print single-run
books (minimum quantity of 100).  Of the 2 that WOULD print a single
set of books, the cheapest was $250.00 (spiral bound, no covers, 8.5"
x 11", cheapest paper available).

Oh, heck. In that case, I'd just take the pdf on a flash drive to my
local Fedex Kinkos and use their self-server printing machines and
print it myself. If you can get it to print double-sided, it should
cost half as much.

Then just 3-hole-punch what you print out and put it into a 3-ring
binder. I've done this myself in the past for docs that I wanted to
have on my shelf and it works great.

 

[Tim Arnold]

I have been searching for a way to print the official Python
documentation into some kind of book (for my own uses). I don't
really care if it's printed on newspaper and bound with elmer's
glue ... any way I can get relatively recent _official documentation_
in print form will do.

I'm on the go a lot, and can't read for long periods of time on LCD
screens anyhow (so having a laptop is not my solution). Until eBook
readers grow up a bit, I'm stuck trying to print the documentation
that I REALLY need to read and absorb.

Lulu.com is an option, but it would cost something around $100 US
before shipping to get everything printed. Also, I would have to
split up some larger documents into Volumes, which I'd rather not have
to do.

Has anyone tried this before? Is the documentation already available
in print?

Thanks,

drfloob

just a datapoint, but I used lulu.com to print the latex sources (525 pages)
hardbound for a cost of $25 US.
--Tim Arnold

 

[Robert Kern]

just a datapoint, but I used lulu.com to print the latex sources (525 pages)
hardbound for a cost of $25 US.

Did they handle the LaTeX fonts well? The last time I looked at Lulu, they
claimed that there were some font issues with PDFs made by LaTeX.

--
Robert Kern

"I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma
that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had
an underlying truth."
-- Umberto Eco

 

[dr.floob]

just a datapoint, but I used lulu.com to print the latex sources (525 pages)
hardbound for a cost of $25 US.
--Tim Arnold

That sounds about right for 525 pages. But the current A4-sized
library reference pdf is 1207 pages alone, and I'm hoping to print /
most/ of the docs.

I managed to get a lot of the documentation (all but some howtos) fit
into 3 books on Lulu. Python Docs LaTeX sources don't seem to be
available anymore, and I haven't dug into reStructuredText yet, so I
massaged the A4 pdfs to fit into 5.5" x 8.5" to drop the price.
Choosing only the most inexpensive options (5.5x8.5, publisher grade
paper, paperback perfect bound, etc.), the numbers came out as
follows:

Total Pages: 2024
Book Cost: $37.87
Shipping: $12.87 (MediaMail, untrackable)

Total Cost: $50.74

All in all, it's the least expensive option I've found, and about as
comprehensive a set as you can get. It probably wouldn't work for
people who can't read small print, though. A letter-sized (8.5" x
11") set would cost maybe 1.5x as much, roughly $75.00.



P.S. At two Kinko's near me, double-sided b/w printing was $0.59 per
page, compared to Lulu's $0.015. 40x as expensive. THOUSANDS of
dollars.