M A N T E X N E W S L E T T E R Number 46 - mid April 2001 FREE tutorials + Writing software ------ ISSN 1470-1863 ----- 0----- 50 FREE literature tutorials We've posted a new series of tutorials in literary studies. There are fifty web pages covering the whole of the "Collected Stories" of Vladimir Nabokov. For those who don't know him, Nabokov is the Russian novelist who switched to writing in English. He writes in a very entertaining style; his best-known work is "Lolita", and he is very funny. If you want to read the "Collected Stories" in conjunction with the tutorials, there's a link to Amazon on each page. http://www.mantex.co.uk/ou/a319/nab-000.htm 0----- 'The Art & Science of Web Design' Jeffrey Veen had a big hit with his first book - "HotWired Style". This is the follow-up - and it's even better. It's an insider's view of how the Net works, and how Web sites should be designed for the user's benefit. It's not a book full of pages of code. These are ideas, strategies, and policies. He analyses big sites such as Yahoo, and shows you how and why they work so well. But for designers there are some excellent tips - such as how to use cascading style sheets to control the layout of your pages. Suitable for intermediate users. Well written. Highly commended. Full review at -- http://www.mantex.co.uk/reviews/veen.htm 0----- Creative Writing - software Anyone interested in software to help with their creative writing efforts might pay a visit to the Writers Store. They specialise in programs for play and screenwriters - with outliners and script generators. http://www.writersstore.com 0----- FREE University Courses Just as many universities are trying to market their courses on the Internet, the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology has chosen the opposite path. M.I.T. announced last week that it will post virtually all its course materials on the Web, free to everybody. This means 2,000 courses and their associated lecture notes, problem sets, syllabuses, exams, simulations, even video lectures. The M.I.T. plan makes no effort to offer fully fledged, accredited courses online. Rather, it will offer course materials free to be combined with teacher-student interaction somewhere else. University officials said they were not worried that, with extensive course materials posted online, students would be less likely to come to class. In fact, the university's provost, Robert A. Brown, said, when course materials are already posted, 'it pushes the faculty in the direction of `How do I best use the contact hours so that people learn?' Full details at - http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/nr/2001/ocw-facts.html 0----- 'Essentials' - the best in DESIGN We've started a new 'Essentials' series which offers recommendations on the best and most popular books. The second in the series is DESIGN. These are the best respected, and most highly rated publications in their subject. They offer guaranteed quality and satisfaction - based not on our judgement, but on those of readers, who have made them best-sellers. The list includes product design, information architecture, document design, theory of design, and writing instructional texts. http://www.mantex.co.uk/reviews/biblios/ess-des.htm 0----- My Clips v1.0 - FREE Clipboard You use the clipboard every time you cut and paste. But the standard Windows clipboard only saves *one* piece of information at a time. Cut or copy a new bite of information, and it wipes out the last. My Clips is a FREE utility which will hold multiple files. This means you can have a collection of ready-made or frequently-used files, ready to paste into any documents. You have access to them from your system tray. That's the cluster of small icons in the bottom right of the Windows screen. http://www.fireup.freewire.co.uk/ (c) Copyright 2001, MANTEX All Rights Reserved PO Box 100 Tel +44 0161 432 5811 Manchester Fax +44 0161 443 2766 M20 6GZ UK www.mantex.co.uk If you like this newsletter, PLEASE FORWARD IT to friends and colleagues. New subscribers should register at the following address -- http://www.mantex.co.uk/newslet.htm FREE BACK ISSUES featuring news items, reviews, and product details are available at - http://www.mantex.co.uk/news/archive.htm Please retain the copyright and subscription information. It may be posted, in its entirety or partially, to newsgroups or mailing lists, so long as the copyright and subscription information remains. If you have any requests, observations, or items you would like to be included in our next issues, just mail us at -- news@mantex.co.uk You receive the MANTEX newsletter because you subscribed to it. If you wish to unsubscribe, go to -- http://www.mantex.co.uk/newslet.htm News-46-April-2001 ISSN 1470-1863 The British Library