Build your own book of TechNet articles

Although the Office Resource Kit offers a set of downloadable books, we realize that there are many more possibilities for tailoring sets of articles for specific environments. So…the good news is that you can now build your own books of TechNet articles. You can pick and choose up to 100 articles from anywhere in the Microsoft TechNet library, arrange the articles in any sequence you like, and save your customized article collection into a book for use either on or offline.

The build-a-book process is a new TechNet feature and is currently in a beta release. It's now available to you in the Microsoft TechNet Library. We encourage you to try it out. Here’s some instructions:

Get ready. You'll need:

• A recent browser. Internet Explorer 8 and Internet Explorer 9 work, as do other recent versions of other browsers. If you use IE 8 or IE 9, make sure they're running in regular browser mode (not in compatibility view mode).
• A Live ID for signing into TechNet.

Make sure you're using the Lightweight view in TechNet. (If you're currently in Classic or ScriptFree view, click Lightweight at the top of the TechNet page.) When you're in Lightweight view, the upper right corner of the page should look like this.

1. Sign in at http://technet.microsoft.com using a Windows Live ID.
2. Click the drop-down arrow next to the printer icon on the upper right corner of the page and then click Print Multiple Topics.
   
   A Help page will open. That page provides Help, but it also serves as your start page.
3. Read the How does it work? overview on the Help page and then click Start. The Print Multiple Topics ^(Beta) toolbar will appear at the top of your window.
4. Browse through the left pane of the TechNet library, and pick topics or folders for your collection. Each time you select a topic or a folder, right-click it to add it to your collection.
• If you right-click a folder, you can choose Add this topic or Add this set of topics. The number in parentheses indicates the number of topics in the set.
  
• If a selected folder contains more than 100 topics, you'll get a notice that says "(100+) Too Many Topics." In that case, you'll have to select topics or sub-folders one by one within that folder.
• If you want to select more than 100 topics, you'll need to create a second book.
5. When you're finished, click Collection on the Print Multiple Topics toolbar (top of page). The Manage Collection page will open and the list of folders and articles that you’ve selected will be displayed.
6. Organize your topics into the sequence you want and into chapter groupings that you like by using drag and drop. You can rename chapters, add more chapters, and delete chapters or topics on this page.
7. Under Advanced Options, in the Export Your Collection area, select the file format you want (XHTML or PDF).
   Note: You must be signed in with your Live ID before you can export your collection.
8. Click Generate.
• While your book is generating, a Generating progress bar will appear at the top of the page.
• When the book build is done, you'll see Finished at the top of the page.
9. Save your book either by right-clicking the Download your Document link, or by downloading the document and then saving it.

To start a brand new collection, click Delete on the Manage Collection page. Otherwise, the articles you selected for the current book build will remain in the collection.

That's it! We really hope you'll find this Beta functionality useful. Please let us now!