October 30, 2018. Montclair, NJ. The Free Ebook Foundation announced the official launch of its GITenberg prototype website.
GITenberg is an exploration of how Project Gutenberg might work if all the Gutenberg texts were on Github, so that tools like version control, continuous integration, and pull-request workflow could be employed. For forty years, Project Gutenberg has led the way in making public domain text live on the internet as ebooks. It is hoped that Project Gutenberg can take advantage of GITenberg's experience; work in that direction has begun but needs resources and volunteers.
Eric Hellman, President of the Free Ebook Foundation, said "It's hard to believe, but GITenberg started 6 years ago when Seth Woodworth started making Github repos for Gutenberg texts. I joined the project two years later when I started doing the same and discovered that Seth was 43,000 repos ahead of me. The project got a big boost when the Knight Foundation awarded us a Prototype Fund grant to 'explore the applicability of open-source methodologies to the maintenance of the cultural heritage' that is the Project Gutenberg collection. But there were big chunks of effort left to finish the work when that grant ended. Last year, six computer-science seniors from Stevens Institute of Technology took up the challenge and brought the project within sight of a major milestone (if not the finishing-line). There remained only the reprocessing of 58,000 ebooks (with more being created every day!). As of last week, we've finally done that!."
Readers can use the GITenberg website (https://www.GITenberg.org/) and Github repos to find, access and download text and ebook files, and to suggest corrections and improvements. The website also links back to Project Gutenberg and to related websites such as Librivox and Standard Ebooks. All the software used to build and serve GITenberg is Free Open-Source Software. Metadata feeds for the entire collection are available through Unglue.it. For more details, see Hellman's blog post.
About the Free Ebook Foundation.
The Free Ebook Foundation (https://ebookfoundation.org)is a 501(c)3 New Jersey non-profit corporation. The Free Ebook Foundation envisions a world where ebooks will be funded, distributed and maintained for the benefit of all, by coordinating the efforts and resources of many.
Donating to the Free Ebook Foundation.
The Free Ebook Foundation is a US 501(c)3 non-profit organization. Our tax ID number is 61-1767266. Your gift is tax deductible to the full extent provided by the law.