We’re just about completely done with the Solaris 9 for Dummies book; all that’s left is reviewing the cover art and text and one or two final “are you sure you meant to say this” questions. That’s the good news. The bad news is that for some braindead reason, the graphic designers at Wiley have decided that my name is “David Taylor”, even though even in contracts I’m Dave.

Which is a pet peeve of mine, and in fact one easy measure of how much people are paying attention to what I’m saying versus projecting their own beliefs and thoughts into our discourse: if I introduce myself as Dave, do they immediately say David?

It’s rather remarkable how often that occurs, as if I’m just being informal with them and they want to demonstrate that, no, we can have a formal relationship or something. Even at school, I’ll say “Hi, I’m Dave Taylor” and someone will not infrequently say “David? I have a question.”

So let’s get this straight once and for all: the only person who can call me David is my Mom. Got it? 🙂

Oh, and here’s the very first draft of the Solaris cover, for your viewing pleasure, warts and incorrect name and all:

There will definitely be changes before it’s published!