All About Updates

When you buy a printed book, you know that its contents won’t change. If the publisher later releases another edition of the book with new information, or a new book on the same topic, you’d have to buy it again from scratch.

With ebooks, we have the opportunity to treat books more like software. Conditions permitting, we generally try to keep our books updated as changes occur in apps, operating systems, cloud services, and other technology. Some books are updated quite frequently, others infrequently, and in rare cases, a book is never updated.

This page provides further detail about updates to our books. Below, you’ll see:

How to Find Out About Updates

The worst way to find out about updates is to email us, because answering those email messages takes time away from actually updating our books! So, please don’t do that. Instead, you can use any or all of these methods:

  • Check Ebook Extras: All our books contain a link to an Ebook Extras page that provides information about the most recent version (including any available free updates or paid upgrades), plans for future updates (if any), and in some cases blog posts, interviews with the author, or other resources. If you’re viewing one of our books in PDF format, click the Ebook Extras badge in the upper-right corner of the cover to view this page. Or, in any format, go to the Ebook Extras topic near the end of the book, in the “About This Book” chapter, and click the “access extras related to this ebook” link. If you purchased your book directly from Take Control Books (in which case you have an account with us), you can log in when you visit the Ebook Extras page. If you don’t have an account, you can still view the page without logging in; just click the close (X) button on the login prompt.

  • Check Your Email: We always email customers to let them know about updates to books they’ve purchased from us. If an update is free, the email contains direct download links; if it’s a paid upgrade, the email contains a link to buy the new version at a discount. However, since we respect your contact preferences, if you’ve opted not to receive email from us, you won’t get these notices. You can change your email preferences on your Account details page. Make sure your contact preference is not set to “(Almost) Never”—and if you want to hear about paid upgrades as well as free updates, set it to “Occasionally.”

  • Read Our Blog: At least once a week, we post an update to our blog, which (among other things) mentions any recently updated books. You can also, of course, subscribe to the blog via RSS.

  • Manually Check Our Site: The catalog page for every book includes update plans, if any. (Click the Update Plans tab. Often, though not always, we also include a box in the book’s main description that states our update plans.) If the page says nothing about updates, either the book is already up to date, or no updates are planned.

Once you download an update, you can generally delete any earlier versions of that book. However, note that at this time, we have no way to enable you to carry over highlighting, bookmarks, or annotations you’ve made in one version of a book to a newer version. If you’ve marked up a book in any way, you’ll probably want to keep the old version around even when you download the new one. (For more help with downloads, see our Device Advice page.)

Our Update Policy

Whether, when, or to what extent we update a book depends on what has changed regarding the book’s topic, the author’s availability, customer demand, and other variables.

We have three types of updates:

  • Bug fix updates: When an update increments the number after the second decimal point—for example, going from version 1.0 to 1.0.1—that’s a very minor update intended to fix small bugs, such as typos, broken links, or other glitches. Bug fix updates are always free.

  • Minor updates: When an update increments the number after the first decimal point—for example, going from verion 1.0 to 1.1—that’s a minor update. We do these to address small changes in the subject matter or add a bit of new information. Minor updates are also always free.

  • New editions: When an update increments the first number—for example, going from version 1.1 to 2.0—that’s a new edition, which is a major update. Major updates typically add significant quantities of new material, and may include structural changes as well as widespread edits throughout the text. We charge an upgrade fee for new editions. The cost to upgrade varies depending on the length of the book, the scope of the changes, and other factors, but most new editions cost half (or less) as much as the full cover price.

    When we release a new edition, we generally offer free updates to people who purchased the previous edition recently. “Recently” typically means 90 days, though depending on the circumstances, sometimes the free upgrade window is shorter or longer. We always do our best to balance generosity toward our customers with fairness to our authors.

Because we often release free updates, some customers have assumed that all updates are free forever. To be crystal clear: We do not guarantee free updates to any book, and the fact that some updates are free does not mean that all are. Our authors don’t work for free, and as a result, we have to charge money for updates that required substantial time and effort to create.

Why Is That Update I’m Waiting For Taking So Long?

In an ideal world, every change to an app, operating system, or anything else “out there” would be reflected within days in our books that mention them. And often we’re able to accomplish just that! (There have been multiple weeks during which we released no fewer than 10 updates!) But sometimes weeks, months, or even years go by during which a book is out of sync with reality. This frustrates us just as much as it frustrates you.

From the publisher’s side, we are literally a mom-and-pop operation. Joe Kissell and Morgen Jahnke, the owners of alt concepts, are the entire company. There’s no other staff. We do, however, have two elementary-aged kids at home, one of whom has significant special needs that require an extraordinary amount of our time and attention. So, sometimes we’re the bottleneck, because try as we might, we can only fit so much work into each day. (And, when it comes to the books Joe has written himself, we’re extra far behind because most of his days are spent wearing his “publisher” hat, which leaves far too little time for writing.)

Updates are sometimes held up because an author has an overloaded schedule, or because an editor is unable to squeeze in a book as quickly as we’d like. All our authors and editors (besides Joe) are freelancers. They all have other work, family responsibilities, and schedule constraints, and they decide on their own priorities. Although we strongly encourage our authors to keep on top of updates, we won’t ask them to blow off another deadline, cut short a vacation, or miss their kid’s soccer game. And life complications happen to all of us.

So if a particular update is not appearing as quickly as you’d like, we’re sorry, and believe us when we say we want it as badly as you do. We’ll do our best, and that’s all we can promise.

Pending Updates (last updated September 8, 2023)

We generally aim to update our most popular titles every fall to reflect the latest Apple operating system releases. This year is no different, and books such as Take Control of Apple Mail, Take Control of Apple Watch, Take Control of Calendar and Reminders, Take Control of FaceTime and Messages, Take Control of Find My and AirTags, Take Control of iCloud, Take Control of iOS & iPadOS Privacy and Security, Take Control of Notes, Take Control of Photos, and Take Control of Securing Your Mac (among others) will be updated for compatibility with this year’s operating systems as soon as we can.

Apart from perpetually updated books like those, as of early September, 2023, there are 13 titles in our catalog that are out of date to one degree or another and for which updates are still planned. (Some of our older titles, such as those covering previous versions of macOS and iOS/iPadOS, will not be updated in the future.) These are mostly rather substantial revisions, and a few of these books need almost a complete rewrite.

Here are some things to notice about this list:

  • We use words like “hope,” “expect,” and “plan.” We wish we could give you an ironclad guarantee that a certain thing will happen at a certain time, but there are far too many variables for that to be feasible.
  • For the books written by Take Control publisher Joe Kissell, which constitute a considerable fraction of this list, we’ve indicated their current order in his personal queue. That order could change! (You may also notice that this list does not contain queue item #2; that is a brand new book, which you’ll hear about in due time.) And remember, that applies only to the books he’s written himself—not those by other authors—so it does not reflect the overall order in which books will be released.
  • This list does not include all the other things on our list that are not books! For example, it doesn’t reflect fixing bugs or adding features on our website, doing customer support, taking care of our kids when they’re sick, shoveling snow, or a thousand other activities.
  • The time required for updates varies wildly from one book to the next. Some of these books may take less than a day to update, whereas others may take multiple months.
  • It is not helpful for you to tell us you think things should occur in a different order. We get it: everything is top priority for someone. We’re going to do the best we can, and this is it.

With those qualifications in mind, here’s our current list of pending updates, in alphabetical order (not the order in which they will be updated):

  • Apple Interface Mysteries (Michael Cohen):
    • Current version: 1.0.1 (April 20, 2020)
    • Status: Mostly up to date
    • Changes needed: In the past three years, Apple has released new operating systems that add still more mysteries.
    • Update plans: Michael hopes to update the book in the fourth quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of LaunchBar (Kirk McElhearn):
    • Current version: 1.1 (September 24, 2014)
    • Status: Mostly up to date.
    • Changes needed: LaunchBar 6 has had a bunch of minor updates, but no major ones, in the last nine years. It still functions more or less as described, though it has some newer features too. In theory, the book could be tweaked to account for the revisions to LaunchBar and newer versions of macOS.
    • Update plans: For years we had assumed that if and when LaunchBar had a major new release, we’d update the book at that time…but that hasn’t happened and we don’t know if or when it will. In the meantime, unless we receive a lot of feedback suggesting that customers want an update badly enough to pay for it, it’s unlikely that we’ll put the time and effort into doing one.
  • Take Control of Mac Basics (Tonya Engst):
    • Current version: 1.1 (January 26, 2018)
    • Status: Badly outdated
    • Changes needed: When this book was released, macOS 10.13 High Sierra was current. The number and scope of changes to macOS since then is just breathtaking. Almost every bit of advice in the book would have to be thoroughly reworked to cover more modern versions of macOS.
    • Update plans: Unfortunately, Tonya is unavailable to do any further updates to this book. So far, we have not found another author with both the time and interest to take over the project. Although we like the idea of having a book about Mac basics, we don’t currently have any plans to update this title. We might simply discontinue it at some point…or we might come up with a different way of covering Mac basics.
  • Take Control of Maintaining Your Mac (Joe Kissell):
    • Current version: 3.1 (January 24, 2019)
    • Status: Appallingly outdated
    • Changes needed: Like Take Control of Troubleshooting Your Mac and Take Control of Speeding Up Your Mac, this book requires not merely a total overhaul but a rethinking from scratch. Among many other things, it has to support newer Macs with M-series processors, Macs using the APFS file system, and the latest hardware and software. In its current state, I can’t stand behind its advice anymore.
    • Update plans: The plan is to create a single new book from scratch that covers maintaining, troubleshooting, and speeding up Macs. It will draw on all three of the old books to some extent but offer greatly updated and simplified advice. That new book is #4 in Joe’s personal queue. We hope, but do not promise, to release it in the third quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of Pages (Michael Cohen):
    • Current version: 3.0 (January 12, 2021)
    • Status: Mostly up to date
    • Changes needed: Although nearly everything in the book is still accurate, Pages has acquired some new features since the book’s last update, and in addition, macOS itself has undergone significant interface changes.
    • Update plans: Michael hopes to release the fourth edition of the book as a paid upgrade in the third quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of PDFpen (Michael Cohen):
    • Current version: 3.0 (May 3, 2021)
    • Status: Mostly up to date
    • Changes needed: Smile sold PDFpen to a company called Nitro, which in turn is apparently about to be acquired by yet another company. So the app has changed names and branding (currently it’s Nitro PDF), and that may change again. Whether, when, or in what form we’ll see the next major revision in features will depend on what the new owners decide to do.
    • Update plans: Ideally, we’ll update the book when the next major revision hits, whenever that may be and whatever it may be called…assuming we have the support of the app’s new owners.
  • Take Control of Podcasting (Andy Affleck):
    • Current version: 1.0 (September 17, 2020)
    • Status: Moderately outdated
    • Changes needed: Since the book’s release, there have been major revisions to macOS and Windows, as well as some of the software and services Andy discusses. So the book has gone a bit out of sync with reality.
    • Update plans: Andy has been working on a revision, but has encountered a series of interruptions. We hope, but do not guarantee, to release an updated book in the third quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of Siri (Scholle McFarland):
    • Current version: 2.0 (December 22, 2020)
    • Status: Moderately outdated
    • Changes needed: Siri has gained some capabilities in the last two years of Apple operating system updates, and the book should reflect those.
    • Update plans: Unfortunately, Scholle is unavailable to update this book further. So far, we have not found another author with both the time and interest to take over the project. If we do, we’d be happy to update the book, but at the moment, we don’t have a path forward for it. If we’re unable to find someone to take it over, we’ll eventually discontinue the book.
  • Take Control of Speeding Up Your Mac (Joe Kissell):
    • Current version: 2.1 (January 24, 2019)
    • Status: Appallingly outdated
    • Changes needed: Like Take Control of Troubleshooting Your Mac and Take Control of Maintaining Your Mac, this book requires not merely a total overhaul but a rethinking from scratch. Among many other things, it has to support newer Macs with M-series processors, Macs using the APFS file system, and the latest hardware and software. In its current state, I can’t stand behind its advice anymore.
    • Update plans: The plan is to create a single new book from scratch that covers maintaining, troubleshooting, and speeding up Macs. It will draw on all three of the old books to some extent but offer greatly updated and simplified advice. That new book is currently #3 in Joe’s personal queue. We hope, but do not promise, to release it in the third quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of Thanksgiving Dinner (Joe Kissell):
    • Current version: 1.2 (November 14, 2012)
    • Status: Slightly outdated
    • Changes needed: Yes, you still roast a turkey exactly the same way in 2022 as you did in 2012! But while using this book to prepare Thanksgiving dinner this year, I noticed a bunch of irritating little mistakes and thought of several ways of improving my advice. In addition, the layout and cover really need to be brought into modern times! So it needs a solid refresh, but because of this book’s unique formatting requirements, it will require more effort to pull off than our other titles.
    • Update plans: This is currently #3 in Joe’s personal queue. We hope, but do not promise, to release a new edition in the third quarter of 2023—ideally well before Thanksgiving in Canada (October 9).
  • Take Control of Troubleshooting Your Mac (Joe Kissell):
    • Current version: 3.1 (January 24, 2019)
    • Status: Appallingly outdated
    • Changes needed: Like Take Control of Maintaining Your Mac and Take Control of Speeding Up Your Mac, this book requires not merely a total overhaul but a rethinking from scratch. Among many other things, it has to support newer Macs with M-series processors, Macs using the APFS file system, and the latest hardware and software. In its current state, I can’t stand behind its advice anymore.
    • Update plans: The plan is to create a single new book from scratch that covers maintaining, troubleshooting, and speeding up Macs. It will draw on all three of the old books to some extent but offer greatly updated and simplified advice. That new book is currently #4 in Joe’s personal queue. We hope, but do not promise, to release it in the third quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of Your Online Privacy (Joe Kissell):
    • Current version: 4.0 (April 11, 2019)
    • Status: Badly outdated
    • Changes needed: So much has changed in the story of online privacy in the past few years that the book’s advice as a whole needs a substantial rethinking. Although the current advice isn’t exactly bad, both the threat model and the tools available to address those threats have evolved tremendously since the last update to the book. Nothing short of a major overhaul will address these shortcomings adequately.
    • Update plans: This is currently #1 in Joe’s personal queue. We hope, but do not promise, to release a new edition in the fourth quarter of 2023.
  • Take Control of Zoom (Glenn Fleishman):
    • Current version: 3.0 (July 22, 2022)
    • Status: Mostly up to date
    • Changes needed: The Zoom app now offers a Desk View, and has undergone a few other small changes since the book’s last revision.
    • Update plans: We are on the fence as to whether or when this book will be updated, because demand has dropped off dramatically.