In an ideal imaginary world, a book is finished only when the author is fully satisfied that every word and comma is perfect. In the real world, that doesn’t work. The only way books ever get finished is with the imposition of a deadline — sometimes from the author him or her self, but most often from a publisher.

This is a good thing. The deadline requires much focused work to drive the book into a completed state. It is one of my fears about online publishing that books will never be finished — that they will exist forever in some slippery amorphous state, forever demanding that they be twiddled and tweaked, enslaving the author in a never-ending cycle of continual revision.

The finality of publication is ultimately liberating. The author is given permission to let go, but more importantly, to move on. This book must be finished and left to live on its own because there are many other books that need to be written.

The cover is not final, and I welcome your feedback. The book is nearing completion, and is on track for publication in May 2008. There is no real product information on Amazon.com yet, so here’s a blurb describing the book:

Anyone who has explored the history, technology, or theory of computers has likely encountered the concept of the Turing Machine. The Turing Machine is an imaginary — not even quite hypothetical — computer invented in 1936 by English mathematician Alan Turing (1912 – 1954) to help solve a question in mathematical logic. As a byproduct, Turing also founded the field of computability theory — the study of the abilities and limitations of digital computers.

Although the concept of the Turing Machine is well known, Turing’s original 1936 paper is only rarely read. This neglect may have something to do with the paper’s title — “On Computable Numbers with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem” — and perhaps the paper’s extensive use of a scary German gothic font. That’s too bad, because the paper is not only a fascinating read but a milestone in the history of computing and 20^th century intellectual thought in general.

This book presents Turing’s original 36-page paper and a follow-up 3-page correction with background chapters and extensive annotations. Mathematical papers like Turing’s are often terse and cryptic. Petzold has elaborated on many of Turing’s statements, clarified his discussions, and provided numerous examples.

Interwoven into the narrative are the highlights of Turing’s own life: his secret work in cryptanalysis during World War II, his involvement in seminal computer projects, his speculations about artificial intelligence, his arrest and prosecution for the crime of “gross indecency,” and his early death by apparent suicide at the age of 41.

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