The technical textbook of the future

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Client: Rupert Gatti, Open Book Publishers <rupert.gatti@openbookpublishers.com>

In fast-moving technical fields, it is hard to keep good textbooks up to date. Online resources such as wikipedia are useful ways to collect expertise, but articles written by technical experts are not always the best way to learn. It's hard work to collect good teaching examples, suggest tests and exercises and so on. Your task is to design an application that offers the best of both worlds - a book that can be accessed from browsers or mobile devices, preserving a clear voice for the author, but also allowing mashups at varying levels of granularity with other textbooks, student forums, class exercises and presentation materials, and discussion among expert teachers at any level of content. Different users (schools, teachers, or learners with special needs) should be able to create the learning paths that suit them best, and also share them with others. The final product shouldn't look like another blog, forum or wiki - you will need to think what design elements and user experiences are associated with a professional and authoritative knowledge source.