"I have never seen open textbooks work in a subject area that requires frequent updates, such as fundamental computer concepts, or modern application software (office suites...)."

Hopefully this will change. I've contributed a lot of my learning materials for OpenOffice.org to the Documentation Project (documentation.openoffice.org/conceptualguide) under an open license, including an eBook version of my paperback title (ISBN 978-0-9778991-6-6), Moodle Course Package complete with quizzes, exams, test bank, exercises, etc. and supplementary materials. With the limited financial and human resources I have to work with, I would say that it has been successful in providing schools the materials they need to consider alternative, open source applications for instructional use.

Best regards,

Gabriel Gurley

Contributor, OpenOffice.org Documentation and Education Projects

I agree that helping schools utilize OpenOffice.org for instruction they provide is one of the best ways to get users acquainted with the office suite. I have written a book specially for use in educational institutions to provide instruction for OpenOffice.org titled "A Conceptual Guide to OpenOffice.org 2.0". More information is available at http://www.conciseconceptsinc.com/.