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Tell HN: Giving away programming books to HN members

50 points by dawson ↗ HN
Due to a sudden decision to quite my day job and return to being a student (leaving IT), I have been sorting through all my books and deciding what I'm going to give to charity etc. The following books I felt would be better served within the HN community. They're all as-new condition, most have never been opened. I'm not asking for any money, I will even pay the shipping costs as I know a lot of us here are bootstrapping start-ups and or students themselves. I do live in the UK though, so if you're asking me to send a book to the other side of the world, it would be nice if you did paypal me at least some of the postage :P

The only rule I have is one book per HN user (it might be good to just say why you want the book / how it will be helpful)! I will update each listing below with a username of the receiver.

Books as follows:

[1] Principles of Biomedical Informatics (Hardcover) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Principles-Biomedical-Informatics-PhD/dp/0123694388/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352239&sr=1-1

[2] Ruby Programming for Medicine and Biology - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Programming-Medicine-Bartlett-Biomedical-Informatics/dp/0763750905/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352284&sr=1-1

[3] Bioinformatics for Dummies - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bioinformatics-Dummies-Jean-Michel-Claverie/dp/0470089857/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352308&sr=1-1

[4] Ferret - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ferret-David-Balmain/dp/0596519400/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352339&sr=1-1

[5] The Ruby Programming Language - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ruby-Programming-Language-David-Flanagan/dp/0596516177/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352356&sr=1-1

[6] Java All-in-one Desk Reference for Dummies (Paperback) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Java-All-one-Reference-Dummies/dp/0470124512/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352380&sr=1-3

[7] Building Bioinformatics Solutions: with Perl, R and MySQL (Paperback) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Building-Bioinformatics-Solutions-Perl-MySQL/dp/0199230234/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352412&sr=1-1

[8] Beginning Ruby on Rails (Wrox Beginning Guides) (Paperback) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beginning-Ruby-Rails-Wrox-Guides/dp/0470069155/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352434&sr=1-2

[9] Designing Virtual Worlds (Paperback) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Designing-Virtual-Worlds-Richard-Bartle/dp/0131018167/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352457&sr=1-1

[10 GONE klaut] Founders at Work - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Founders-Work-Startups-27-Startups-Problem-Solution/dp/1430210788/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267352477&sr=1-1

For those willing to contribute to shipping, my paypal is dk401@cam.ac.uk - don't worry if you can't afford postage, I'll still send the book to you.

50 comments

[ 2.5 ms ] story [ 95.4 ms ] thread
klaut
Well, i would love to have founders at work. i am in the uk as well. How do i send a "formal" request to you? :)
dawson
It's yours
klaut
Thanks a lot! email sent :)
atlantic
I'd really like to have The Ruby Programming Language. I've been interested in Ruby for quite a while now, and having a hard copy of this reference is going to make me take the step in investing the time to learn the language.

I'm in Portugal, btw. If you need some funds for the p&p, just let me know how.

dawson
It's yours
atlantic
Thank you very much. I sent the email...
sandis
I would love to improve my knowledge of Java and "Java All-in-one Desk Reference" seems to be a perfect fit :) E-mailed you
julsonl
The Principles of Biomedical Informatics looks interesting. Can I have it?
bosse
I'd like [8], emailing you.
kloncks
[9] sounds fascinating from its Amazon page. Could I have that one?

I just emailed you as well.

dawson
It's yours (it's awesome btw, I read this one!)
kloncks
There are ones you're giving away without even reading :P ?
dawson
Most of them I haven't read! I have a problem with buying books and not reading them, I need help. I just like buying/collecting books :(
awa
Same problem here, I have made a rule that I won't buy a book unless I finish one of my to read list. Though I still checkout books frequently from the library.
dawson
Remaining:

[2] Ruby Programming for Medicine and Biology - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Programming-Medicine-Bartlett-Biomed...

lw0x15
I'd love to have [3]. If you live in London, i might as well just pick it up from your doorstep.
dawson
It's yours (no I'm Cambridge, I'll post it to you :))
LaPingvino
Still the only one remaining? If noone else wants it for a better reason, I am interested.
Tichy
I would be interested in "Designing Virtual Worlds". Living in Germany

What is your new field of study? Perhaps I could send you a book in exchange, as I hate Paypal.

dawson
Sorry, it's gone :( Theology
bmj
Anything in particular?
dawson
Bachelor of Theology BTh (applied), at Cambridge
messel
The ruby programming language or beginning ruby on rails could be handy. Are they available? Reach me at messel at gmail dot com.

Thanks for the generosity, solid positive karma!

dawson
Sorry, only book left is, [2] Ruby Programming for Medicine and Biology - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Programming-Medicine-Bartlett-Biomed...
messel
That's probably better for the eager hands of a computational biologist considering dipping their toes into programming. Hey Dawson, I'm writing up a short blog post about your generosity, is there a homepage I can link to besides your HN profile?
dawson
Wow wasn't expecting that ;) erm just my twitter page I'm afraid? @dawson you could link to that I guess
[deleted]
(comment deleted)
micrypt
[7] Building Bioinformatics Solutions: with Perl, R and MySQL (Paperback)

- sent an email earlier.

dawson
I know you e-mailed me first but I had given it to someone who posted in the comments after, so I'll send you out a new one from Amazon. Thanks
oomkiller
Wow, you are quite generous!
[deleted]
(comment deleted)
dawson
The books have now all gone, I will try my best to get them all posted next week. Thanks everyone.
maxklein
Are you giving away only your books, or are you also giving up programming? Did you recently find your faith, or why did you decide to go for theology?
dawson
I will still program as a hobby, just not full-time, as I have the past twelve years.

I am a Christian and I am applying to study Theology both for personal and professional reasons. I wish to deepen my understanding of God and my relationship with Him. Professionally, I have recently begun work on a new Christian Community Interest (CIC) start-up designed for social enterprise that will use profits and assets for ministry, community service and outreach, on both a local and global scale. A better grounding in theology will therefore not only be personally fulfilling but essential for developing this new ministry.

ig1
I've actually got a pile of programming books I'd like to get rid of as well, but don't want to give them to my local charity shop as I'm guessing they're unlikely to find any buyers for them there. Anyone having any other suggestions (well other than just posting to HN) what to do with them ?
gilesbowkett235
I'm in the same boat. I'd be happy to give books away to people locally (I'm in Los Angeles) but I'm kinda too busy to deal with the post office. There's a cool web site or two that address this problem (a friend of mine is a big fan of one which I believe is called PaperbookBookSwap.com or something like that), but it's not worth it to me to wait at the post office. (Waiting in lines drives me nuts.)

In the past I've given books away to the local library. Where I live now, they only take donations on Saturday mornings, so I've just been giving them to Goodwill instead. There's something about donating a Haskell intro to Goodwill that fills very stupid, though. I hope they have some system where they put them all on eBay or sell them upstream somewhere to some kind of distributor, but I think they just throw them on the shelves.

If we were to build or find some kind of "free programmer books" site where we could just co-ordinate giveaways, I'd be very happy to kick in a ton of books, and probably to keep doing so for years.

AnneTheAgile
FYI, nowadays if you have more than one [I think 2 is the number] of priority mail items, you can request a USPS pickup!
cema
I do not need the books but I want to thank you for the idea.
allynbauer
I would love #2 if it is available. allyn.bauer at gmail dot com