This week I published my first book! I’ve been writing “The Coding Dojo Handbook” since last September, and publishing it as a work-in-progress on Leanpub.com. This week I decided it was time to declare it completed, since I think it hangs together as a whole book, and is useful in the role I imagined for it. In other words, I think this book has everything it needs to be a good starting point for someone setting up a new coding dojo, or for someone experienced in running one already, looking for ideas for new katas and collaborative games. I hope you’ll consider getting a copy if you’re in either of those situations!
Now the book is finished, I have to decide whether to look for a “real” publisher, or whether to just continue to sell it on leanpub. My current feeling is that my target audience, (programmers), are quite comfortable buying an ebook, and having a paper copy isn’t really a priority. The advantage of a publisher might be more sales channels, bookshops etc, and more copies sold overall. I’d also get a considerably lower proportion of the sale price. I’ve noticed that several authors I respect – people like Brian Marick and Roy Osherove – are publishing their newer titles exclusively on leanpub.com. So my current plan is to stick with leanpub and see how things develop.
I had originally planned a few more chapters, about London School TDD, and Approval Testing. When I started writing these chapters, I found I had far more to say than I had anticipated, and it didn’t seem to me that the material really fitted into this book. So what I’ve done is started a new book project, called “Mocks, Fakes and Stubs”
Right now it’s fairly small, more a pamphlet than a book, and I’m not charging a lot of money for it. If, as I hope, there is interest, I plan to add more material over the next few months. The focus is on showing TDD techniques using some of the code katas from “The Coding Dojo Handbook“. I’m hoping the new book will have the feeling of pair programming with an experienced coder, explaining the theory of a technique at the same time as demonstrating it.
I’ve got a couple of workshops coming up, at XP2013, when I’ll be doing research for my new book. Basically I’ll be using code katas to explore TDD techniques like Outside-In, Approval Testing, and Given-When-Then style BDD tests.
So my first book is finished, and I have a new book project to occupy my time!
