Have lots of ideas, but need a kick start to get a project off the ground? Let the Library help!
We can have lots of ways to assist you:
KPU Pressbooks help: contact Caroline.Daniels@kpu.ca, or
Karen.Meijer-Kline@kpu.ca.
Online guides:
BCcampus Pressbooks Training Guide
Pressbooks User Guide
H5P is a powerful tool that will help your Pressbooks be interactive. The video below shows you how simple it is to add H5P elements!
You can find a lot of examples of H5P on their website at https://h5p.org/content-types-and-applications. Remember that BCcampus may not have all of the options listed there available, however, you will get a good idea of how the different elements can be used.
BCcampus provides access to hundreds of open textbooks on their Open Textbook Site - you can adopt & adapt them. They also provide helpful resources surrounding the use and creation of open textbooks:
Creating a book on the BCcampus Pressbooks site does not automatically mean it becomes part of their Open Textbook library (even if you set your book to 'publish'). If you would like your book to be considered as part of the BCcampus Open Textbook collection, you should review their criteria at https://open.bccampus.ca/suggestion-for-the-collection/. The library can help!
Ready to start writing your textbook? Or collating the work you have already written in the past into a publishable format?
KPU has it's own Pressbooks installation. You can set up your account at here.
BCcampus also offers a Pressbooks account to all faculty at British Columbia Post secondary institutions.
The library can help you get set up on either the KPU or BCcampus Pressbooks site.
Pressbooks is simple book production software that allows you to write your own book, or import your manuscript, and export into several file formats you need to publish your books including MOBI(for Kindle), EPUB, and PDF and more.
You cannot use Internet Explorer with Pressbooks. Try a different browser like Chrome or Firefox
TIPS:
If you need a refresher, this short video will get your back on track!
The Pressbooks dashboard is very similar to WordPress. This video is a great step by step review of the left side menu of Pressbooks.
Before you start your new book, spend under 2 minutes watching this video for time saving tips!
Before you get too far ahead in your writing, it's a good idea to think about how you will organize your content. You might even be able to build a shell to put your content into. Find out how Pressbooks categorizes content. Then take it further and add, edit and organize your content!
Changed your mind? Want to change the order of content? No Problem. You can easily change the order of chapters within your Pressbook by selecting the Organize tab, or the drop down in the top right corner once in the chapter. It's even possible to change the order of the Parts. See the video for step by step instructions.
There are some great help guides on Pressbooks:
Q. How do I embed a Power Point file into Pressbooks?
A. Open an account on SlideShare; upload your file and make it public. Then grab the URL and embed it in Pressbooks using the Visual view. It should automatically open the presentation within the Pressbook. Here's a good step by step guide for this - Embedded Media & Interactive Content.
Q. How do I use my H5P questions from my Pressbooks in Moodle?
A. Select the embed prompt from your H5P question (it's at the bottom of the question) in Pressbooks, and copy the code. Move to your Moodle site and add it into the source code. Your question will be transported!
Q. Can I change the 'next chapter' or 'previous chapter' prompts that appear on the bottom of the screen in Pressbooks?
A. Not at this time though that suggestion has been made to developers.
Q. Not all the H5P question types are appearing in my Pressbook. How can I make them available?
A. Sometimes you need to load the H5P library in order for certain questions to appear. Look at https://h5p.org/content-types-and-applications and choose a sample question that you want to use in your book. To add any of these content types to Pressbooks, download the sample question that h5p provides and upload it into Pressbooks via the "Add new" page. This should ensure that that content type will appear as an option when creating new h5p activities.
Q. I'm trying to read an online textbook and the formatting is very mixed up. How can I fix this?
A. With Pressbooks, browsers can make a big difference. They definitely do not format well on IE. Try Chrome or Firefox to see if that helps.