Unless the books published by iBooks Author can be played on devices not made by Apple I don't see how this is a big deal. I know books can be exported to PDF but a PDF doesn't have the same capabilities as an iBook2 on an iPad.
I tried creating a document in iBooks Author and I'm disappointed. It doesn't allow one to embed a Youtube video. One can get around this by creating a Dashcode widget and using the widget to play a Youtube video but this seems like too much work. As a teacher, why would I go through all this trouble just to create a book than can only be properly viewed on Apple devices? I'm not requiring my students to by Apple products.
> It doesn't allow one to embed a Youtube video. One can get around this by creating a Dashcode widget and using the widget to play a Youtube video but this seems like too much work.
> [...]
> I must be missing something. What?
That what you're doing is, sorry to say, absolutely stupid. Embedding a youtube video? Why not just frame wikipedia pages while you're at it? You're trying to embed not only content which may not last in time, but content which will bring down your network when 30 students launch the video at once. And you're creating a book which requires an internet connection, which is bloody terrible.
Why don't you just embed the video itself, which is surely supported?
Only .mv4 is supported. I hardly think that 30 students watching a Youtube video is going to bring Youtube down. Given the ubiquity of internet connections I don't think this is too hard a requirement.
Presently, all digital mathematics content made available to students from publishers requires an internet connection. And is an iPad app going to contain an entire semester's worth of video content? How many gigs would that take? The iPad doesn't have enough disk space to hold more than a couple of books with all of the lecture videos contained within it. As such, isn't a better idea to allow <embed> tags and have Youtube videos played from within the iBook accessing the internet? I think so.
Your first sentence is rude. I don't think it is appropriate for this website.
" As a teacher, why would I go through all this trouble just to create a book than can only be properly viewed on Apple devices? I'm not requiring my students to by Apple products."
You might create a book if you worked for a school district that as policy provides iPads to the students. That's the value proposition Apple is offering: schools spend a ton of money on buying textbooks and buying new editions every so often. If Apple can make it cheaper to use iPads, then the school benefits by switching to iPads.
That's a fair point. I'm in higher education and our school doesn't buy books. I've created video lectures using Camtasia using a Wacom tablet and pen. The notes are in PDF format and I've created my own exercises. Students for one of my classes don't need to buy a book because I've got everything done for that course.
I'd like to use something like iBook Author but only if I can export it in a device independent way.
I tried creating a document in iBooks Author and I'm disappointed. It doesn't allow one to embed a Youtube video. One can get around this by creating a Dashcode widget and using the widget to play a Youtube video but this seems like too much work. As a teacher, why would I go through all this trouble just to create a book than can only be properly viewed on Apple devices? I'm not requiring my students to by Apple products.
I must be missing something. What?