OVERVIEW: This page is meant to help you get quickly started on editing an open textbook or creating your own open textbook. The information below is taken from the Open Textbook Network (OTN) publications "Modifying an Open Textbook: What You Need to Know" and "Authoring Open Textbooks." Links to these resources can be found in the Resources box located to the left of this section.
STEPS TO EDIT AN EXISTING TEXTBOOK
Step 1: Check license to confirm that the open textbook you want to adapt has a license that allows modification and redistribution on the scale you need.
Step 2: Identify the format of the open textbook you’d like to modify. Formats include PDF, EPUB, MOBI and more.
Step 3: Assess the editability of the format you are choosing. For example, textbooks containing mathematical or scientific notation, non-roman alphabets, or diacritic language characters may require specific editing software.
Step 4: Determine access - you’ll want to decide where and in what format students can access your revised open textbook. Some students prefer reading a printed version; others prefer reading online or using an e-reader. Also, you will need a stable place to keep your textbook so that students can access it. Options include distributing the open textbook via your: institutional repository, learning management system (LMS), personal website and campus bookstore.
Step 5: Publish your textbook - remember to give proper attribution and choose an open license based on how the textbook you adapted was licensed. Solicit feedback as a way to identify errors and fix them.
Note: if you decide to publish your new textbook with an open license, you must ensure that all of the material within it is openly licensed. Also, to make your new textbook is findable, you may want to add your new textbook files to a well-known textbook repository such as the OTN Digital Library and/or NJIT's institutional repository.
CHECKLIST FOR AUTHORING YOUR OWN OPEN TEXTBOOK
Scalar is an open source scholarly writing and publishing platform used to create and annotate digital media-rich content. It is developed and supported by the Alliance for Networking Visual Culture (ANVC) and hosted by the University of Southern California. It is a popular tool in humanities scholarship for digital writing and publishing.
The Scalar Research Guide will introduce some of the basic set up tasks, functions, and features of Scalar. To learn more,register for an account or sign in to your existing account to get started.
For inspiration, take a look at some of the projects created with Scalar: http://scalar.usc.edu/works/
Digital Commons @ New Jersey Institute of Technology
The repository is a service of the New Jersey Institute of Technology libraries. Research and scholarly output included in the repository has been selected and submitted by the individual university departments and centers, and deposited by the libraries staff. Contact us at digitalcommons@njit.edu to learn more about including your work in the repository.
The resources below can be viewed or downloaded locally.
RESOURCES
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