|
Softpanorama
(slightly skeptical)
Open Source Software Educational Society |
May the
source be with you,
but remember the KISS principle ;-)
|
Softpanorama Bookshelf:
Unix System Administration Books Reviews
Maintained by Dr. Nikolai Bezroukov.
Links and bibliographical information
about the books are prepared in
association with Amazon.com
Good introductory book (or better books) save you a lot of trouble,
especially if one try to learn Linux/Unix independently. Actually a good book
can make a difference between success and failure in moving from widows to Unix
environment. Unix is a complex OS and there is a tremendous difference in quality
among introductory books. Please be careful. Some books are available in electronic
format, see Unix CD bookshelf, 3d edition and
Safari
One of my recommendations for very basic introductory books is Mark
Sobell's books. He breaks one rule that I talked about in the
introduction: the book value is strongly correlated with
the quality of the authors web site, if any. The author web site
www.sobell.com is weak, but
the books are decent. You can
read an interview with Mark G. Sobell.
All Mark Sobell Unix books contain two parts: the first is tutorial
and the second is reference. Both are good. The reference is close to man pages,
but always contain examples -- a sad omission in original Unix man pages (along
with obsolete format -- HTML would be much better and more modern choice).
Those examples alone are worth the price of the book.
For Solaris books see my Solaris
page that I created after Sun's initiative to open Solaris. Solaris 8
is free on computers with up to 8 CPUs and is a very good OS, especially for using
with commercial databases. IMHO Oracle on Linux is a rather shaky proposition despite
all recent Oracle hype and handwaiving.
Most Unix vendors have documentation available online and the last
thing you want is a reproduction of man pages in printed format. You need to check
for such a correlation :-). See my Solaris links.
Actually it was DEC that has the best documentation available online...
If you have no chance to browse book yourself in a nearby bookstore,
open content books are definitely preferable -- at least you know what to expect
and you can adapt/add to electronic text to suit your needs. See also
Softpanorama CD Bookshelf
Dr. Nikolai Bezroukov
|
You can use Honor System
to make a contribution, supporting this site
|
|
Peter Salus
A Quarter Century of UNIX
Jon Lasser Think UNIX
Mark Sobel
Softpanorama Review: A Practical Guide to Red Hat Linux 8
Mark Sobel
A Practical Guide to Solaris
Arnold Robbins Classic
Shell Scripting
Bill Rosenblatt Learning
the Korn Shell
NIIT Special Edition
Using Solaris 9
This is a policy/procedures handbook with a wrong title. The authors try to
exploit IT management goldmine. The topic is complex and advice should be taken
with the grain of salt... The most interesting parts of the books are connected
with non-technical aspects of system administration. For example books provides
some advice of negotiations (32.2.1. Learn to Negotiate) and time management (see
also the other . Please note that this is a non-technical book and some reviews
reflect this fact.
- Paperback: 1056 pages
- Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional;
2 edition (July 15, 2007)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0321492668
- ISBN-13: 978-0321492661
- Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.8 x 2 inches
- Shipping Weight: 3.2 pounds (View
shipping rates and policies)
Here is how author define who should read the book:
Who Should Read
This Book
This book is written for system administrators at all
levels. It gives junior SAs insight into the bigger picture of how sites
work, their roles in the organizations, and how their careers can progress.
Intermediate SAs will learn how to approach more complex problems and how
to improve their sites and make their jobs easier and their customers happier.
Whatever level you are at, this book will help you to understand what is
behind your day-to-day work, to learn the things that you can do now to
save time in the future, to decide policy, to be architects and designers,
to plan far into the future, to negotiate with vendors, and to interface
with management. These are the things that concern senior SAs. None of them
are listed in an OS's manual. Even senior SAs and systems architects can
learn from our experiences and those of our colleagues, just as we have
learned from each other in writing this book. We also cover several management
topics for SA trying to understand their managers, for SAs who aspire to
move into management, and for SAs finding themselves doing more and more
management without the benefit of the title.
Throughout the book, we use examples to illustrate our
points. The examples are mostly from medium or large sites, where scale
adds its own problems. Typically, the examples are generic rather than specific
to a particular OS; where they are OS-specific, it is usually UNIX
or Windows.
One of the strongest motivations we had for writing this
book is the understanding that the problems SAs face are the same across
all OSs. A new OS that is significantly different from what we are used
to can seem like a black box, a nuisance, or even a threat. However, despite
the unfamiliar interface, as we get used to the new technology, we eventually
realize that we face the same set of problems in deploying, scaling, and
maintaining the new OS. Recognizing that fact, knowing what problems need
solving, and understanding how to approach the solutions by building on
experience with other OSs lets us master the new challenges more easily.
We want this book to change your life. We want you to
become so successful that if you see us on the street, you'll give us a
great big hug.
Topics include:
-
The key elements your networks and systems need in order to make all other
services run better
-
Building and running reliable, scalable services, including web, storage,
email, printing, and remote access
-
Creating and enforcing security policies
-
Upgrading multiple hosts at one time without creating havoc
-
Planning for and performing flawless scheduled maintenance windows
-
Managing superior helpdesks and customer care
-
Avoiding the "temporary fix" trap
-
Building data centers that improve server uptime
-
Designing networks for speed and reliability
-
Web scaling and security issues
-
Why building a backup system isn't about backups
-
Monitoring what you have and predicting what you will need
-
How technically oriented workers can maintain their job's technical focus
(and avoid an unwanted management role)
-
Technical management issues, including morale, organization building, coaching,
and maintaining positive visibility
-
Personal skill techniques, including secrets for getting more done each
day, ethical dilemmas, managing your boss, and loving your job
-
System administration salary negotiation
|
|
Excellent book for Sysadmin career development,
November 13, 2001
I am very impressed by this book. I've been a Unix sysadmin for more
than 10 years and this is the best book I have read for explaining and
demonstrating basic and advanced principles of system administration.
And it goes beyond administration of any particular OS or system type.
You could apply this to your work architecting, supporting, implementing
or administering any computer or network service.
I have many technical books. I do not read them all cover to cover.
But I will completely devour this one.
I work on a team of 18 (already excellent!) Unix sysadmins. I would
love to have every team member read this book -- our team would be better
for it. you may especially enjoy the section on sysadmin salary negotiations.
|
Purely theoretical., March 31, 2002
This book is full of theories and advice, but it fails to mention any
means of implementation.
|
A non technical book on system administration, February
9, 2002 By A Customer
I'm surprised by the reviews of this item. They almost seem to have
been written by the authors' friends. Also I don't see why they refer
negatively to Mark Burgess's great book Principles of Network and System
Administration, which is a different kettle of fish -- more scientific
and less touchy feely. I like both books, but I prefer Burgess's more
direct approach -- this book seemed to meander around all over. |
One of the few books that have only positive reviews on Amazon ;-)
Time Management for System Administrators understands that an Sys
Admin often has competing goals: the concurrent responsibilities of working
on large projects and taking care of a user's needs. That's why it focuses on
strategies that help you work through daily tasks, yet still allow you to handle
critical situations that inevitably arise.
Among other skills, you'll learn how to:
-
Manage interruptions
-
Eliminate timewasters
-
Keep an effective calendar
-
Develop routines for things that occur regularly
-
Use your brain only for what you're currently working on
-
Prioritize based on customer expectations
-
Document and automate processes for faster execution
Here is one quote:
|
Adequate sleep fixes a slew of
problems. Everyone is different and needs a different amount of sleep.
Getting the right amount helps you deal with stress better.
During a particularly stressful
week, I find that if I get an extra hour of sleep I'm able to manage
stress better. I feel better, I'm more relaxed, and I get along with
people easier.
The problem is that getting an
extra hour of sleep is difficult. We usually can't sleep an hour late,
so our only choice is to go to sleep an hour earlier. That's hard! There's
so much good TV to watch, books to read, chatrooms to play in, web sites
to visit, games to play, and so on.
The only way I'm able to get myself
into bed earlier is with a little help. I ask my significant other to
be involved (in other words, force me to do it). If you don't have a
significant other, have a friend call and nag you. Or, set an alarm
that can ring to remind you to go to sleep.
I can't just go to sleep earlier.
It's a process. I have to do nothing for a half-hour to wind down enough
to be ready to sleep. It's pretty difficult for me to do nothing, but
I usually get there in about 15 minutes. I think of it as a countdown.
At T-120, I stop eating or drinking. At T-30, I wash up. At T-15, I
start doing nothing. At T-0, I turn off the lights and crawl into bed.
At T+5 I'm...zzzzzzz.
|
Here is a couple of insightful reviews by Amazon readers:
Something for everybody, December 28, 2005
System administrators have a stereotypical reputation for grumpiness
and irritability. Some times this misanthropy is a cultivated pose,
designed to deter casual or trivial requests that would take time away
from more important activities like playing nethack and reading netnews.
More often, however, sysadmins are disgruntled simply because they can't
seem to make any headway on the dozens of items clogging up their todo
lists. If you're an example of the latter case, you may find some help
in <em>Time Management for System Administrators</em>, the new book
from Thomas Limoncelli (who you may recognize as one of the co-authors
of the classic <em>The Practice of System and Network Administration</em>).
This slim book (only 226pp) packs a large amount of helpful information
about making better use of your time at work, so that you can make some
headway on at least some of those tasks that have piled up around you,
while still managing to have a life outside of work. One of Limoncelli's
main points is that sysadmins have to develop some way of effectively
dealing with the constant stream of interruptions in their life if they're
going to accomplish anything. The other point is that they also need
a good tracking system to make sure they don't lose track of new, incoming
requests in the process of dealing with existing ones. The book continually
reinforces these two points, and presents several alternative, complementary
ways to accomplish them.
The first three chapters deal with high-level, generic issues: principles
of time management, managing interruptions, and developing checklists
and routines to help deal with the chaos of day-to-day system administration.
The middle third of the book details how to use "the cycle system",
Limoncelli's task management plan for sysadmins. Basically, it's a hybrid
between Franklin-Covey A-B-C prioritization and day planning and David
Allen GTD-style todo lists, with a few sysadmin-specific tweaks thrown
in. The final chapters of the book address a grab-bag of issues: task
prioritization, stress management, dealing with the flood of email that
all admins seem to get, identifying and eliminating the time sinks in
your environment, and documenting and automating your work-flow.
In general, I think this is a great book for sysadmins that are looking
to begin addressing time management problems. People that have already
done some investigation of time management techniques (like the aforementioned
Franklin-Covey and GTD systems) may find less value here -- but I still
think the book will be interesting, especially the chapters detailing
the workings of "the cycle system". Personally, after reading this book,
I don't see any reason to move away from my modified GTD system, but
I have gone back to using some daily checklists, which are helping me
keep on top of my repeating tasks a lot better. I suspect that any working
sysadmin will take away at least two or three productivity-enhancing
tips from this book. |
An excellent book, October 3, 2007
Time Management for System Administrators is a book not only aimed at
system administrators but also other task and interrupt driven employees
early in their career. It presents a core concept of use to anyone struggling
with a "never ending TODO list of doom" both for business and personal
tasks. Some of the information is of a very basic nature such as "do
short tasks and important tasks first". Part of this, however, could
be Thomas Limoncelli's writing style which is detailed almost to a fault.
It is, however, a very easy book to read and I found myself going through
quite a few pages in one sitting.
On the negative side the analogies the author uses to try and explain
time management in computer terms get a bit thick at times in the first
few chapters but soon they run out and are no longer in the way of the
points being made. Two other somewhat awkward chapters are the Stress
Management and Automation chapters. Is it worth the time to write (or
read) a chapter to basically tell us to occasionally take a vacation
and to get a massage? It seems like filler to pad out the book. Similarly,
the important take-away point of the automation chapter is to, well,
automate things! However the chapter contains an overly specific set
of shell programming tricks the author has learned over the years. These
are of course presented as examples of how to automate, but the amount
of time spent on details and anecdotes makes this chapter also feels
like pad. The time spent in these chapters could have been better spent
on the core points of the book.
What is the most valuable information in this book? The core technique
is what the author calls The Cycle System. This is a way to manage your
TODO list so at the end of each day every item assigned to that day
has been addressed, if not necessarily completed. It's a very useful
technique for learning to plan, to ensure you follow through with completing
tasks and to improve your sense of accomplishment that you are managing
your workload. Interestingly the author has always used a paper-based
TODO list and calendar, so each technique of The Cycle System is explained
both for paper and digital (PDA) methods. The Cycle System can help
by providing a framework for managing tasks other than continuing to
add them to an ever growing list, however it still requires a lot of
discipline to properly schedule tasks in the future to avoid them all
piling up on the task list for the current day. After several weeks
of using the system it is certainly a workable method as long as you
are honest with yourself on the amount of real work you can accomplish
in a single day and you dedicate a good bit of time on a regular basis
to future planning and scheduling of tasks that aren't high priority
or due immediately. Unfortunately, the author doesn't go into a lot
of detail on techniques to handle the issue of building up a backlog
of low priority tasks other than to suggest daily, weekly and monthly
planning times to reprioritize and reschedule tasks. The issues of email
management, interruptions, unexpected tasks, request tracking software
and even life goals are addressed. This portion of the book is where
the true value lies and it provides a good amount of information.
If you currently have no structured task management system this is a
great resource to start with. You'll certainly come away with a wealth
of information on getting a system in place to start to manage things.
If you forget to complete tasks or tell someone you'll do something
only to forget it when the next person you run into starts you on a
new problem, then this book will be very useful to you in how to manage
interruptions and always follow through. If you are fresh out of school
and you're in an IT job where tasks are starting to pile up, this book
will be of even more benefit to you with its stories and broad IT specific
topics. As such I would recommend this book to anyone in a task and
interruption oriented job as a basic primer on how you should be expected
to manage yourself. If you are in a computer job, so much the better,
but regardless of your line of work you can still learn a great deal.
Ranked at four stars due to the issues discussed above, but still very
highly recommended! |
Are there any books you would recommend to someone interested in improving
their understanding of Unix? Even though I use it every day, I feel like my
understanding is incomplete. I would like to read one or two books, preferably
under 300 pages each, that would make me a lot smarter when it comes to Unix.
And I figure reading about Unix at bedtime would help me fall asleep faster.
The Real PC
Friday, May 28, 2004
Advanced Programming in the Unix Environment, Stevens.
SG
Friday, May 28, 2004
I like "Linux System Administration - A User's Guide" by Marcel Gagne' (Addison
Wesley).
It's not fat, and it's full of useful info. The downside is that Gagne's
writing style is good enough that it might not help put you to sleep.
yet another anon
Friday, May 28, 2004
I always learned fun new things from Unix Power Tools.
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/upt2/index.html
m
Friday, May 28, 2004
Keep in mind that while I've used multiple languages on unixes, I'm nowhere
near being an expert, just gotten in 'n out. So I hope someone will point out
if my mentions are outdated.
- Kernighan/Mashey "Unix Programming Environment" paper. Since it's a paper,
it's rather short.
- Ritchie/Thompson original paper might put things in perspective.
- Kernighan/Pike _The Unix Programming Environment_ book.
- Maurice/Bach _The Design..._ book goes into detail.
- Nemeth/Snyder/... unix sysadmin book might be useful.
- Unix Hater's Handbook, gratis online.
Tayssir John Gabbour
Friday, May 28, 2004
If you use it every day, but you're looking for more, I recommend O'Reilly's
"Essential System Administration." Describes the evolutions of the different
branches of Unixes, and how they differ. Each part of the book describes
how to do something in the different ways peculiar to different Unix-alikes.
It does have a sysadmin bent, of course, but you still might want to check it
out.
Rich
Friday, May 28, 2004
I second the Unix Power Tools reccomendation. It has taught me more
about unix than any other unix book I've bought, or any one site online.
Its not small, but its not designed to be read straight through. Its a collection
of tips from newsgroups and email lists over the past 20+ years.
It won't teach you tons of sysadmin stuff, but it will make you a much more
effective unix user, which will translate into a better sysadmin.
I cannot reccomend this book enough.
Andrew Hurst
Friday, May 28, 2004
I'll third Unix Power Tools. It makes learning Unix fun.
Herbert Sitz
Friday, May 28, 2004
I have some of the nicest linux and unix books under the sun!! :D If you
read through any 15% of them you'll be able to create a cluster of computers
capable of curing AIDS.
They are gathering dust. *sigh* However I probably will not sell them. Maybe
for a future project that might accidentally change the world.
Li-fan Chen
Friday, May 28, 2004
Ask me for the list, it's long.
Li-fan Chen
Friday, May 28, 2004
> I feel like my understanding is incomplete
None of the books recommended so far gives you the "big picture", and (IMHO)
you will never become proficient in UNIX (be it programming or system administration),
until you have a good mental model of the whole.
The best book for the "high-level view" is "Operating Systems: Design and Implementation"
by Andrew S. Tanenbaum.
His other books are very good as well, and "Structured Computer Organization"
is worth a read no matter which OS you are using.
Employed Russian
Friday, May 28, 2004
I also like The Unix Philosophy which leans more towards the programming
life, but sets a frame of reference for why unix is as it is.
m
Friday, May 28, 2004
"The Unix Haters Handbook"
http://research.microsoft.com/~daniel/uhh-download.html
;-)
Friday, May 28, 2004
Eric Raymond's 'The Art of UNIX Programming' Is a bn="right">john
Saturday, May 29, 2004
Linux Server Hacks
100 Industrial-Strength Tips and Tools
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/linuxsvrhack/
Michael Moser
Saturday, May 29, 2004
A personal favourite is "The UNIX Programming Environment" by Kernighan and
Pike. Like UNIX itself, this compact book is either dated or timeless.
M. E.
Saturday, May 29, 2004
I second the Unix Programming Environment, by Kernigan and Pike.
Unix power tools is a good one, as others have mentioned it's a collection of
tips for using commands. Ever tried to figure out the find command from
the manual? It bites, but Power Tools tells you how to do what you want
done.
The Stevens book is great, but only for system programmers. That would
be me.
Think Unix by Jon Lasser is another great book on overall Unix stuff.
Snotnose
Saturday, May 29, 2004
Great free resources. In case of LINUX some guys are trying
to create something in the likes of MSDN.
Linux documentation project
http://en.tldp.org/
Developer works tutorials (need to register/fill out a form)
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/views/linux/tutorials.jsp
Developer works technical library (need to register/fill out a form)
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/technical/linux.html
Michael Moser
Sunday, May 30, 2004
Get "The Design and Implementation of the BSD Operating System". I haven't
read the latest version, but it used to be pretty good in the old days.
Just me (Sir to you)
Monday, May 31, 2004
by
Kirk Bauer
- Paperback: 574 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.22
x 9.20 x 7.02
- Publisher: APress; (September 2003)
- ISBN: 1590592123
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 2 reviews.
Write a review.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 1,485
- Contents:
Chapter 1: The Basics.- Chapter 2: SSH: Your Best
Friend.- Chapter 3: Login Scripts and Shell Scripts.- Chapter 4: Pre-Installation:
Network Preparation and Management.- Chapter 5: Automating and Customizing Installation.-
Chapter 6: Configuration.- Chapter 7: Sharing Data.- Chapter 8: Packages and
Patches.- Chapter 9: System Maintenance and Changes.- Chapter 10: System Monitoring.-
Chapter 11: Security.- Chapter 12: Backing Up and Restoring Data.- Chapter 13:
User Interfaces.- Appendix A: Basic Introduction to Tools.- Appendix B: Customizing
and Automating Red Hate Linux Installation.- Appendix C: Building RPMs.
A P R E S S . C O M
Chapter 1--Introducing the Basics of Automation
Chapter 2-- Using SSH to Securely Automate System Administration
Chapter 3--Creating Login Scripts and Shell Scripts
Chapter 4--Pre-Installation: Network Preparation and Management
Chapter 5--Automating and Customizing Installation
Chapter 6--Automatic System Configuration
Chapter 7--Sharing Data Between Systems
Chapter 8--Packages and Patches
Chapter 9--System Maintenance and Changes
Chapter--10 System Monitoring
Chapter 11--Improving System Security
Chapter 12--Backing Up and Restoring Data
Chapter 13--User Interfaces
Appendix A Introduction to Basic Tools
Appendix B Customizing and Automating Red Hat Linux Installation
Appendix C Building Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) Packages
Automation - the easy way., October 6, 2003
If you are disciple in the church of Wall, or like me you believe that laziness
is the father of invention, or if you simply have more than a couple *nix machine
to administer, Kirk Bauer's new book Automating Unix and Linux Administration
is definitely for you. From the creator of the popular open source projects
AutoRpm and LogWatch comes a thorough - and believe it or not entertaining -
look at how one can leverage the power of a few common tools to significantly
reduce the time and effort system administrators spend doing their jobs.
From the outset Bauer takes a straightforward and principled approach to
problem analysis. Usually starting with anecdotal example scenarios (many of
which will have you saying "been there before") and progressing through ideals,
goals and consequences, he examines many of the common issues facing system
administrators with candor and realism. Almost nowhere in the book does the
author assume an authoritarian stance, he questions his own decision making
process and encourages the reader to come up with exceptions to his rules. Fundamentally
Bauer has one goal - to develop a comprehensive system for reliably automating
the tedious but important tasks that all system administrators face on a recurring
basis.
Admittedly, it would be a fallacy for any book to claim complete and comprehensive
coverage of all things related to system administration and Bauer does no such
thing. When the author touches on topics that obviously require more depth than
a single chapter can afford, he is certain to include at least one reference
(and in many instances more) to alternate publications without bias to any particular
publisher or author. Having said that, the book's scope and depth of topic coverage
is impressive. Starting with an exhaustive examination of SSH and progressing
through cfengine, NFS, LDAP, RPM and Tripwire (just to name a few) Bauer provides
carefully detailed instruction on how to automate tasks ranging from simple
network management and software packaging to security, monitoring and backups.
The author even goes so far as to suggest methods for efficiently front-ending
automation systems for the less technical of users.
Although not expressly stated in the text, the overall theme of the book
is walk on the shoulders of giants. Starting with simple example scripts (in
both Bash and Perl) and many single-line commands, Bauer builds on the content
of each previous chapter as the book progresses. Examples shown in early chapters
are incorporated into more complex systems one step at a time. Following along
is easy, each script or command is detailed on a line-by-line basis, and because
of Bauer's principle-based approach the reader is rarely left wondering why
the author has chosen a particular tool or implementation. More often than not
the elegance of how Bauer pieces together methods and procedures will excite
you about the possibilities for automation of your own systems.
Although Bauer explicitly states that readers are presumed to have more than
a modicum of experience in system administration even the novice administrator,
as well as those that are responsible for only a handful of machines, will find
this book invaluable. Also included are three appendices which provide an easy
introduction to basic shell tools, creating your own RedHat distribution and
how to package software as RPM's. These portions of the book alone justify the
less than $40 price tag, but for those that run clusters or data centers this
book stands to save you countless hours of repetitive headaches. Published by
apress and boasting nearly 600 pages this lively read has made itself a permanent
addition to at least one reference library.
by
Steve Oualline (Author)
- Paperback: 624 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.30
x 9.16 x 6.98
- Publisher: SAMS; 1st edition (April 11, 2001)
- ISBN: 0735710015
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 17 reviews.
Write a review.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 49,761
Actually not a bad book.
Does anyone actually read the books they review???, July 23,
2001
I decided to learn Vim because I work on WinNT/2K, Linux, and Macintosh
boxes. Using a single editor makes it easier to work on mulitple platforms.
My review of this book is mixed. First, it's the only book on Vim
and it contains a lot of information, so that's a plus. Also, it shed
a lot of light on using the editor that, frankly, the help files did
not (you can look up *ANYTHING* via ":help <topic>", but the documentation
is not very accessible to the new user). However, the typos, errors,
bad grammar, and personal idiosyncracies of Mr. Oualline just have to
be seen to be believed.
You can figure out most of the errors easily enough. For example,
there's a reference to the non-BUI version of Vim (I think he meant
GUI)and for some reason, in the word "filename", when used as an example
(e.g., "type 'vim filename'"), the "fi" is sans-serif while the rest
of the example text is in bold Courier. There are, however, numerous
places where the diagrams don't match the example being discussed in
the text or are just plain wrong. Some of these left me wondering if
I had missed something, but trying out a command in Vim quickly showed
the diagram was wrong. My favorite goof is where '#' (the command to
search backwards for the word under the cursor) is shown in numerous
places in Appendix C (pp. 445, 449, and elsewhere) as a British money
sign (e.g., "/count/ L"), where L is the pound sign. Get it? Pound sign?
Obviously the person who did the Appendices and Index (and copy-editing???)
was not Mr. Oualline.
With regard to the content, I found that Mr. Oualline is very idiosyncratic.
Vim is VERY flexible, using ancient Vi ways of doing things, as well
as more modern ways that are easier to use. Take yanking (copying) a
block of text to a register (like the clipboard). *Mouse way*: select
lines, press y. *Visual way*: move cursor to top of lines to be selected,
press V, select lines, press y. *Vi-ish way*: go to top of lines to
be selected, press "ma" to drop a mark labeled "a", go to bottom of
lines, type y'a (yank from current position to mark "a").
If you consider these different styles (mouse, visual, or Vi-ish)
to approaching the same general problem, Mr. Oualline always goes with
the Vi-ish style, to the point of also showing you in many cases how
to precede the command with a line range instead of using marks. Where
Ctrl-Wn (open a new window) will do, we get Ctrl-W Ctrl-N (equivalent).
Where Ctrl-W<down> moves down one window, we get Ctrl-W Ctrl-J (the
arrows aren't mentioned). My guess is that this is not how the majority
of new users will use Vim (though it might be handy if you find yourself
using Vi or Vim via telnet).
A real barrier to learning the editor is the immense number of variations
for accomplishing a given task. Multiple keystrokes to accomplish the
same thing, as well as different approaches. What would be great for
Vim is an attempt to break down tasks into functional groupings (movement,
formatting, programmer stuff, managing buffers/windows) and choose a
style (probably visual mode, which is almost interchangeable with mouseing)
so you can say "here's a good way to get started." The many variations
can be left as an excercise for power users. They are available in the
online help, anyway.
All in all, I learned a lot about Vim from this book. But if I hadn't
been determined to do so, I would have given up. If you want to learn
Vim and the online docs aren't doing it for you, buy this book. You've
been warned, so just chuckle when you come across errors and general
weirdness. Kudos to Mr. Oualline for writing a book, but don't give
up your day job. :-) BIG raspberries to New Riders for letting this
slip through without proper editing. And thanks to Bram, who put up
an unofficial list of errata at www.vim.org.
|
Jeffrey S. Horwitz
- Paperback: 552 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.23
x 9.08 x 7.48
- Publisher: SAMS; 1st edition (August 9, 2002)
- ISBN: 0672323729
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 5 reviews.
Write a review.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 453,097
?????
The Practice of System and Network Administration
by
Thomas A. Limoncelli,
Christine Hogan
- Paperback: 776 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.45
x 9.22 x 7.38
- Publisher: Addison-Wesley Pub Co; ; 1st edition (August
14, 2001)
- ISBN: 0201702711
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 18 reviews.
Write a review.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 21,268
A must have for any sysadmin, regardless of skill level, November 18,
2001
| |
Reviewer: Amy Rich from Beverly,
MA |
As a UNIX sysadmin veteran, I wish this book
had been around when I started out. It would have saved so many headaches as
I "learned the hard way."
Though not a nitty gritty technical book, this
one is a must have for every sysadmin, regardless of skill level or the technology
s/he uses. For the novice admin, it offers a good big picture look at
the most important "whys" of system administration. For the intermediate admin,
it has great advice on how to balance fire fighting with project work
that will lessen the need for the fire fighting. For the senior admin,
there are gems of design wisdom and sections on how to deal with being in a
managerial or team leader role. Because it's more high level, this book is even
a good buy for people who manage sysadmins but are not themselves technical.
The chapters are conveniently split into the
"basics" and the "icing," depending on the skill of the reader and the state
of the reader's work environment. The authors back up their sound advice with
real world case studies and personal experiences. Best of all, not only was
it a good read cover to cover, it's organized so that the reader can come back
to it as a reference later.
Kudos to Tom and Christine for writing an excellent
book, one which I will certainly be recommending to my clients and colleagues!
A book without implementation details, but hard to beat, July 14, 2002
"The Practice of System and Network Administration"
(TPOSANA) sat on my shelf for nearly a year before I read it. I wish now I'd
read it a year ago! It's rare to find a book useful to both Windows and UNIX
system administrators, but rarer still to read one designed to improve one's
career and attitude.
TPOSANA is a 'framework' book. It teaches you
how to think and leaves out the implementation details. System administration
isn't all about man pages and tech books. The authors' principles -- simplicity,
clarity, generality, automation, communication, and basics first -- will make
a good sys admin great and a great sys admin extraordinary.
Others have outlined the TPOSANA contents, so
I'll share my favorite aspects of the book. The writing is lively and witty,
with memory-jogging conclusions nicely summarizing each chapter's contents.
The text is filled with dozens of applicable and informative case studies.
Finally, the authors devote seven chapters to fundamental management
and personal attitude issues, showing they know people and processes matter
as much as products.
I highly recommend TPOSANA. The sad irony is
those most needing to read this book will push it aside, as I initally did.
Those who take the time to read it will be glad they did. Anyone acting in a
technical capacity -- sys admins, engineers, and programmers -- will find it
enlightening and entertaining.
Systems Administration as a Liberal Art, May 29, 2002
The thing about this book is that it's a theoretical
treatise on systems administration as a discipline in and of itself. There's
no other book like it on the market, and Limoncelli and Hogan do a great job
of showing us the core competencies and knowledge that define a systems administrator,
the knowledge that has nothing to do with what specific systems or networks
we're actually running. Up until now, the only way you'd get this knowledge
was if you were lucky enough to apprentice under an experienced systems administrator
or if you read between the lines of other systems administration books, and
figured out the metaknowledge contained in their lists of commands to type and
single platform descriptions.
If you're a new sysadmin starting out, reading
this book will give you the edge that would take at least 5-10 years on the
job to get--and only a few sysadmins who attack the job from more of an academic
perspective will get. It's mostly a book about how to think, much like a liberal
arts education teaches you how to think. Perhaps the liberal arts background
of the authors is showing a bit.
If you're an experienced sysadmin, you still
probably haven't put it all together this way before. If you're a manager, you
need to read both the chapters on how to manage sysadmins, as well as the chapters
that tell what your sysadmins will be doing to get what they want from you.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who has
an interest in systems administration as a discipline, science, art, career,
or job function.
- Amazon price: 90.97
- Paperback: 616 pages
- Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates; ; 3rd edition (February
2003)
- ISBN: 0596003927
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 61,450
This is an expensive CD. The Unix
CD Bookshelf packs six books: one excellent, two good and three semi-useless/obsolite.
Version 3 provides convenient online access to seven books. It also includes
the hard copy of Unix in a Nutshell, Third Edition.
**** Unix Power Tools, 3rd Edition;
??? Learning the Unix Operating
System, 5th Edition;
??? Learning the vi Editor, 6th
Edition;
??? Mac OS X for Unix Geeks;
***** Learning the Korn Shell,
2nd Edition;
**** sed & awk, 2nd Edition;
*** Unix in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition.
The CD has a master index, a powerful
search engine, and all the text is extensively hyperlinked, so you'll find what
you're looking for quickly.
- Mark G. Sobell
- Paperback: 1616 pages ; Dimensions (in inches):
2.31 x 8.80 x 7.86
- Publisher: Addison Wesley Professional; ; Book
and CD-ROM edition (December 19, 2002)
- ISBN: 0201703130
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 31,532
Table of contents:
- Table of contents:
- Log in on and get familiar with your system--Chapters 2-5
- Use and customize graphical user interfaces (GUIs)--Chapters 6-8
- Understand and use networks--Chapter 9
- Master the vim and emacs text editors--Chapters 10-11
- Work with the bash, tcsh, and zsh Shells--Chapters 12-15
- Write complex shell programs (scripts)--Chapters 13-15
- Use sophisticated software development tools--Chapter 16
- Perform system administration--Chapter 17 Part III is a reference
guide to more than 85 GNU/Linux utilities.
The title is misleading. This book is pretty much usable as a Solaris introduction
(you can skip GNU/Linux ideology pages that the author added to this addition
:-). IMHO this Mark Sobell's book is one of the best introductory Unix no matter
what flavor of Unix you are using. It covers a lot of command line ground that
are essentially common and Gnome that is now used with Solaris too.
This is a hell of a book with its 1616 pages :-). But you can
judge general quality of material by browsing chapters that Mark Sobell provides
online:
I browsed those chapters and I instantly recognized the level and the quality
of his previous books. A very nice typesetting too. -
- I have an extremely high opinion about his prev. book
on Solaris as well as the first Linux edition and I hope that he
managed to improve his prev. edition of the Linux book (1997) considerably in
those six years since the first edition.
- One remark: using pine as a newsreader as in Chapter 9 is fine if you are
limited to the command line. If not, than Netscape Communicator (in its Mozilla
incarnation) is much more user friendly and easier to use program.
I also somewhat doubt that Red Hat should be called GNU/Linux system :-)
I think there is a very little risk in buying this book for Solaris user or
beginner administrator. -
-
Allan N. Packer
- Paperback: 538 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.31 x 9.23 x 7.02
- Publisher: Prentice Hall; ISBN: 0130834173; 1st edition (December
15, 2001)
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 3 reviews.
Write a review.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 17,595
-
- Paperback: 864 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.78 x 9.16 x
7.46
- Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media; ISBN: 0072223057; 1st edition
(April 3, 2002)
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 3 reviews.
Write a review.
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 9,959
Vast improvement, June 27, 2002
Reviewer: Daniel O'Riordan from New York City, New York
I bought the Solaris 8 version of this book. It was OK but did not contain sufficient
material on the new technologies. I ordered the Solaris 9 version of the book
because it's the only Solaris 9 book around. I am happy to report that this
book covers new technologies like RBAC, LDAP and the resource manager. These
are so much more important for the enterprise than GNOME. Strong emphasis on
disks - format, partition, volume management, backups - is good and logically
ordered. The only thing I would like to see is more coverage on application
servers, databases, message queues and other uses of Solaris in large firms.
But that's probably an architecture book with a different focus.
by Aeleen Frisch
- Amazon Price: $38.47
-
- Paperback: 1104 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.76 x 9.20 x
7.00
- Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates; ISBN: 0596003439; 3rd edition
(August 15, 2002)
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 58 reviews.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 6,830
Probably the intermediate best sysadmin book on the market.
-
The New Edition is Great, September 13, 2002
Reviewer:
phillguy (see more about me) from Ann Arbor, MI USA
Well, it was a long wait, but the new third edition is great. Covers a couple
of Linux distro's, FreeBSD, and your standard Unix platforms. More complete
coverage of networking and security. More readable than the previous edition.
Good for anyone with minimal Unix experience or those who have worked with
it for years.
-
- by Jon Lasser
- Our Price: $23.99
Paperback - 295 pages 1st edition (July 2000)
Que; ISBN: 078972376X ; Dimensions (in inches): 0.75 x 9.09 x 7.29
-
The problem with this book that an intended audience is pretty unclear. In
no way this is an introductory book. A beginner will be confused and bewildered
trying to learn Unix from this book. IMHO the only role in which this book can
be useful is as an add-on to the existing library for those people who already
know Unix a little bit and can buy books for the company money. After reading
the book the simple question arises: "Why this book was so rushed to the market?"
In a current form the book is a way too short to be a decent introduction
and many important things are just mentioned, not explained. Unix is such a
complex system that an introductory book below 500 pages is immediately suspect.
And in this case suspicions are correct: this is not a competitor to Sobel's
books or "Unix Complete". Again, it probably might be a useful add-on to a better
introductory book, but this book cannot stand on its own.
The author is also suspect by being a coordinator of Bastille: a set of low
quality Red Hat hardening scripts ;-).
A sample chapter is above average in quality, but might be the best chapter
of the book. Style is good and important points are properly emphasized,
but still there are some problematic statements, for example:
The hard way to redirect STDERR relies on a feature
present in only some Unix shells: numbered file handles. The
Bourne, Korn, and Bash Shells all have this feature. The C Shell and
tcsh don't. For more about shells, see Chapter 6. For now, simply type
the following command to find out which shell you have:3
cat /etc/passwd|grep ^ username:|cut -d : -f 7
- A blank after ^ is a typo and generally the whole regex should probably
be in quotes. Besides NIS, this is incorrect for NIS+ or if any shell wrapper
(for example SecureID) is installed. I also strongly doubt that "A file handle
is an abstract representation of a file." IMHO file handle is a pointer
to a system block for a particular file.
not a life-saver, but surely a life-improver, October 23, 2000
Reviewer:
Edward J. Hyer (see more about me) from Baltimore, Maryland USA
The reason I cannot call Mr. Lasser's book a "life-saver" is because I would
not have perished from the Earth without it. Indeed, I probably would have figured
almost all of the stuff in this book out, given six or seven years. But you
gotta ask yourself, "at what cost?" In hair torn out (it's leaving fast enough,
isn't it?), in hyperventilation (save that for the gym), in premature aging.
This book is not for Dummies. This book works best with
people, as I may have indicated above, who Would Have Figured It Out
by themselves. But while you may pretend to enjoy a rugged hike through the
steeper parts of the learning curve, Mr. Lasser's book is like strapping on
a jet-pack.
The book is conversational, sometimes funny (though it helps
if you spend a lot of your time in front of computers), and extremely direct.
If you are just curious about what this Unix thing might be good for, read the
book slowly, learn a lot, and gain a solid foundation for becoming the captain
of your computing destiny. If you have something you need to get done, read
it quickly, learn-- well, a lot, and get where you're going in a hurry.
One caution: this book does expect that you will read it.
It is not a ready reference, it is not designed for index-backward utilization.
It is a short course in the skeletal framework of Unix, and not a hypertext
instruction manual. If you are unaccustomed to reading as it was practiced before
computer self-help books arrived to chaff the bookstores of our nation, you
will not derive the maximum benefit from this book.
I recommend this book to (prospective) users of unix systems
who take pleasure in reading, and need to learn a great deal very quickly.
- "The book is available both on paper
and in a free online version. Both contain the same text and examples. This
is a short review of that title."
- "An exhaustive and nearly exhausting
examination of the issues, tools, and techniques related to running more than
one operating system on the same computer. If you're interesting in running
any two or more of Linux, FreeBSD, BeOS, OS/2, DOS, and any flavor of Windows
on the same system, this book could be just the thing you need at 2AM when things
so seriously wrong, or you simply can't figure out how to do something simple
in a multi-OS setup. Highly recommended."
- This book takes a different approach in that it steps through the development
of a fictional application. The application you will build is an interface for
a DVD rental store."
by
Warren W. Gay
Amazon price: $29.99
Paperback - 576 pages 1 edition (April 18, 2000)
Que Education & Training; ISBN: 0789722410 ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.38 x
9.21 x 7.47
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 8,798
Avg. Customer Review:
Number of Reviews: 3
- by
Kurt Wall
Amazon price:
$24.99
- Paperback - 560 pages
1 edition (December 3, 1999)
Que Education & Training; ISBN:
0789722151 ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.29 x 9.06 x 7.34
Amazon.com Sales Rank:
28,612
Avg. Customer Review:
Number of Reviews: 4
- by
Kurt Wall
Amazon price: $39.99
- Paperback - 817 pages (August 1999)
Sams; ISBN: 0672316072 ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.88 x 9.10 x 7.34
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 75,109
Avg. Customer Review:
Number of Reviews: 11
- First edition was average. It looks like
Linux Programming by Example (By Example) by the same author is a better
(and cheaper) book.
- Gerald Carter, et al / Paperback / Published 1999
Amazon price: $14.99 ~ You Save: $10.00 (40%)
- Paperback - 490 pages
Bk&Cd Rom edition (April 20, 1999)
Sams; ISBN: 0672316099 ; Dimensions
(in inches): 1.74 x 9.10 x 7.40
Amazon.com Sales Rank:
863
Avg. Customer Review: *****
- Number of Reviews: 8
- Covers Samba 2.0. See ERCB review
Samba
-
Peter Dyson,
Stan Kelly-Bootle
Paperback / Published 1999
Amazon price: $15.99 ~ You Save: $4.00 (20%)
Stan Kelly-Bootle (skb@crl.com) -- a famous author of
Understanding Unix and
The Computer Contradictionary
- Keith Haviland, et al / Paperback / Published 1999
Amazon price: $36.95
-
Please remember that it's not always cheaper to print the book if you are using
you own laser printer and paper.
-
Using Samba -- O'Reilly open content book on Samba.
Jay Ts Corrected version
- ***+
Unix Cd Bookshelf (Contains 6 books and software) -- A very good deal
! Usually ships in 24 hours
- Daniel Gilly(Editor) / Paperback / Published 1998
Amazon price: $55.96 ~ You Save: $13.99 (20%)
-
- This is a very good deal. A must to have CD for any Unix sysadmin. Probably
the most competitive deal on Unix books that you can find on Amazon. The UNIX
CD Bookshelf contains six books from O'Reilly (plus the software from UNIX Power
Tools) with a master index a search engine. HTML text is hyper-linked.
A hardcopy of UNIX in a Nutshell: System V Edition, is also included, but I
believe you should sell it to keep cost down.
-
- The CD-ROM contains three good and tree average books:
-
-
Learning the Korn Shell. -- excellent, but slightly outdated.
This book is definitely underrated on Amazon.
-
UNIX in a Nutshell: System V Edition; -- this is a reference
like man pages. Average in quality , but still useful. The main problem
is that the book lucks decent example for each utility/command covered,
but you can use Power tools to compensate for this.
-
UNIX Power Tools, 2nd Edition (with software); -- very good,
but slightly outdated.
-
Learning the UNIX Operating System, 4th Edition; -- average
-
sed & awk, 2nd Edition; -- good
-
Learning the vi Editor, 5th Edition; -- average
-
The main advantage of buying this collection is that you can
print some useful parts from each book and have your own "meta-book" at a reasonable
cost. I just wish that O'Reilly included Frish's book
Essential System Administration, 2nd Edition
on the CD too.
- ***+
Slackware Linux Unleashed Full text:
http://www.mcp.com/personal/
- Tim Parker(Editor)/ Paperback / Published 1997, Third Edition/ ISBN: 0672310120
Amazon price: $39.99 ~ You Save: $10.00 (20%)
Tim Parker is a very good author. Although it says "Slackware" this only
pertains to the installation, the rest of the book is great for any Linux system.
It covers a lot of ground. This book is especially useful for a user who was
a "advanced user" in Dos or Windows before. Good style... It's easy enough for
beginners and advanced enough for intermediated. Although the book is about
one year old it has not yet become outdated. The most recent Linux book from
MCP bookshelf. CD-ROM in paper edition includes source code and two books in
HTML format.-
- ***+
Unix Unleashed : System Administrator's Edition
e-text is available from MCP bookshelf
- Robin Burk, et al / Hardcover / Published 1997
Amazon Price: $41.99(30% off)
- UNIX Unleashed: System Administrator's Edition is one of the best introductions
to UNIX system administration that I have ever seen. From fundamental topics
such as "What is UNIX?" to advanced system administration procedures, this book
covers the entire range of technical information. Moreover, the book includes
technical details specific to several major UNIX implementations including HP-UX,
AIX, and Solaris.
- ****
Unix Unleashed ~ Usually ships in 24 hours
e-text is available from the book CD
- Robin Burk, Salim M. Douba / Hardcover / Published 1999
Amazon price: $34.99 ~ You Save: $15.00 (30%)
-
- Design of the Unix Operating
System
- Marice J. Bach / Hardcover / Published 1986
-
Unix: Network Programming - W. Richard Stevens; Hardcover
- see also:
W.
Richard Stevens' FAQ
-
Essential System Administration, Third Edition
- by
Aeleen Frisch
- Our Price: $38.47
-
- Paperback: 1104 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.76 x 9.20 x 7.00
- Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates; ISBN: 0596003439; 3rd edition (August
15, 2002)
- Average Customer Review:
Based on 58 reviews.
Write a review.
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 6,830
-
The New Edition is Great, September 13, 2002
Reviewer:
phillguy (see more about me) from Ann Arbor, MI USA
Well, it was a long wait, but the new third edition is great. Covers a couple
of Linux distro's, FreeBSD, and your standard Unix platforms. More complete
coverage of networking and security. More readable than the previous edition.
Good for anyone with minimal Unix experience or those who have worked with
it for years.
Unix in general and Linux in particular is a complex OS and any
introductory book that has, say, less than 800 pages is suspect. You just need to
put a lot of stuff into the introductory Unix book. Some books like all Mark Sobell
books are structured in two parts with the second part containing a reference. This
is a good idea for the introductory book as man pages are often difficult to use
for novices, but content of the first part suffers (Sobell's books do not contain
chapters on AWK and SED -- a sad omission for the introductory book, but it contain
a pretty decent information about this utilities in the reference part of the book).
The problem is that Sobell authored a general Unix book (A
Practical Guide to the Unix System, 1994 see below) and never updated it,
his more recent books are about Linux and Solaris.
They are covered in my Linux and
Solaris pages. Here we will cover general introductory
books.
- ****+
A Practical Guide to Red Hat Linux 8
- Mark G. Sobell
-
- Paperback: 1616 pages ; Dimensions (in inches):
2.31 x 8.80 x 7.86
- Publisher: Addison Wesley Professional; ; Book
and CD-ROM edition (December 19, 2002)
- ISBN: 0201703130
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 31,532
Table of contents:
- Table of contents (abridged; full can be found
here)
- Log in on and get familiar with your system--Chapters 2-5
- Use and customize graphical user interfaces (GUIs)--Chapters 6-8
- Understand and use networks--Chapter 9
- Master the vim and emacs text editors--Chapters 10-11
- Work with the bash, tcsh, and zsh Shells--Chapters 12-15
- Write complex shell programs (scripts)--Chapters 13-15
- Use sophisticated software development tools--Chapter 16
- Perform system administration--Chapter 17 Part III is a reference
guide to more than 85 GNU/Linux utilities.
- This is a hell of book with its 1616 pages and Red Hat 8 CD included :-).
And this is not "blind date" type of the book. On his website the author provides
the text of four chapters (Ch 5: The Shell I, Ch 7: GNOME Desktop Manager, Ch
9: Networking and the Internet, Ch 12: The Shell II: The Bourne Again Shell).
What I really like about Mark Sobell's Unix books is that all of them contain
two parts that can be considered as a separate books. So in essence you buy
two books for the price of one.
- The first part is tutorial. There are ~1K pages in this part,
more than in many introductory books for the same price :-). What is especially
good, each chapter contains "Exercises" and "Advanced exercises" at the
end. They help learning a lot and should be considered an integral part
of the book. That distinguishes this book positively from the bulk of similar
books. IMHO the last chapter of this part is not the least: Sysadmin chapter
(ch. 17 p 895) might help a lot those who installed Linux at home and struggling
with Linux administration. But of course it cannot replace a book on Linux
administration and was not intended to.
- The second part is reference. Starting from page 1081 there is
a reference that contains ~300 pages. It could easily stand on its own as
a separate book. It's actually pretty competitive with O'Reilly Unix in
a Nutshell and I would prefer Sobell's second part to them because of the
quality of examples.
The book also has pretty usable index and five appendixes. Appendix A (regular
expressions) actually deserves to be converted to a chapter.
This edition is a result of polishing the material from four previous editions
and that shows. For example in the Chapter 2 (p.38) the author mentions the
problem of using Ctrl-Z by the beginners who attempt to undo some command line
changes. But this is not a Windows environment and that actually postpone the
program -- a very puzzling situation for beginners for which very few Unix beginner
books authors provide a helpful advice. Useful tips can be found in almost any
chapter and it is this attention to details that really make this book an outstanding
example of the introductory Unix textbook.
Another interesting feature of the book is that the command line environment
is introduced after GUI (KDE/Gnome) environment. Such an approach is more modern
than "command line first" approach and provides an opportunity for students
immediately transfer their Windows-based skills to Linux and master command
line after that, saving a lot of frustration (vi as the first Unix editor is
a torture, I know that for sure :-). In this case beginners can postpone struggling
with vi until they get to speed with pipes and classical Unix utilities. Actually
this permit studying vi in more depth. We should not forget than most students
now study Unix after they learn Windows and Sobell's book in one of the few
that take into account this situation.
I used his previous Solaris-based book for several introductory Unix classes
at the university and can attest that students grasp most material very easily.
Exercises given after each chapter can serve as a basis of very useful homework
assignments.
As for shortcomings there are very few of them and they generally does not diminish
the high value of the book. For some reason gawk and sed are not covered in
the main chapters, but only in the reference part. I would change this is a
future edition(s).
Grep and find probably also can be covered a small separate chapter (or the
author may wish to swap it with the chapter 14 --the second shell (c shell)
might be an overkill for the introductory book (bash is now "good enough") and
it's better to move it into supplement :-). I would also convert the supplement
about regular expressions into a regular chapter and devote some space to Perl
(Z-shell can go to the supplement too; I doubt about wisdom of covering three
shells in an introductory book.)
It's really sad that Perl is not mentioned at all while the whole chapter is
devoted to zsh: in reality Perl killed shell scripting in all but simple and
special purpose (startup) cases. And although the decision whether to include
Perl chapter or not should probably be better left to the author (it complicates
the book as such has some drawbacks too), I think that it make sense at least
to provide a supplement with Perl overview in future editions.
Another minor thing: using pine as a newsreader as in Chapter 9 is fine if you
are limited to the command line. If not, than Netscape Communicator (in its
Mozilla incarnation) is much more user friendly and easier to use program.
All-in-all I hope everybody who is trying to master Linux will appreciate the
level of insight into this pretty complex environment that this book provides.
It beats similar books not only by weight :-). IMHO this book is as close to
a classic Linux book as one can get.
-
- P.S. It's extremely rare and generous for such an author as Mark Sobel to
provide three chapters online and I applaud his courageous decision:
I browsed those chapters and I instantly recognized the level and the quality
of his previous books. A very nice typesetting too. -
- I have an extremely high opinion about his prev. book
on Solaris as well as the first Linux edition and I hope that he
managed to improve his prev. edition of the Linux book (1997) considerably in
those six years since the first edition.
- One remark: using pine as a newsreader as in Chapter 9 is fine if you are
limited to the command line. If not, than Netscape Communicator (in its Mozilla
incarnation) is much more user friendly and easier to use program.
I also somewhat doubt that Red Hat should be called GNU/Linux system :-)
I think there is a very little risk in buying this book... -
- ****
A Practical Guide to Solaris ~ Usually ships
in 24 hours
- Mark G. Sobell / Paperback / Published 1999
Amazon price: $26.95
- Paperback - 1120 pages
1 edition (June 1999)
Addison-Wesley Pub Co; ISBN: 020189548X
; Dimensions (in inches): 1.62 x 9.62 x 7.39
Amazon.com Sales Rank:
388
Avg. Customer Review:
*****
Number of Reviews: 3
-
- A very good book, probably not only the best introductory Solaris book available
but the best overall introductory Unix book. I used this book for an introductory
Unix class at the university and can attest that students grasp most material
very easily. Exercises given after each chapter can serve a basis of useful
homework assignments.
This edition is a result of polishing the material in three previous editions
and that shows. For example in the Chapter 2 (p.23) the author mentions
the problem of using Ctrl-Z by the beginners who attempt to undo some command
line changes. But this is not a Windows environment and that actually postpone
the program -- a very puzzling situation for beginners for which very few Unix
beginner books authors provide a helpful advice. Another example of attention
to details is that this is one of the few intro Unix books that recommends a
reasonable .profile file that make Solaris/Unix more user friendly. All-in-all
tremendous amount of useful tips can be found in almost any chapter and this
attention to details really make this book an outstanding example of the introductory
Unix textbook.
Another excellent feature of the book is that Solaris/Unix command line environment
is studied along with X windows environment. such an approach is more modern
than pure command line approach and it provides additional insights into how
best use Solaris/Unix in a particular circumstances. For example I am convinced
that the approach adopted in the book of using X-based editors first is an improvement
over traditional methods of introducing students to vi from the beginning. In
this case beginners can postpone struggling with vi until they get to speed
with command line and that experience can simplify mastering vi features and
permit to study vi in more depth. We should not forget than most people study
Solaris/Unix after they learn Windows and Sobell's book in one of the
few that make necessary adjustments for this situation.
What I really like about Mark Sobell's Unix books is that all of them contain
two parts:
- The first part is tutorial. There are 681 pages in this part,
more than in many introductory books for the same price :-). What is especially
good, each chapter contains "Review exercises" at the end. Actually
here I would like to see improvement from previous editions, but they are
not that significant and some good exercises that were a part of earlier
editions disappeared without trace from this one :-(. But still exercises
are good and from the point of view a university teacher that distinguishes
this book positively from the bulk of similar books. The shell script chapters
are well-organized and have plenty of examples. But some old useful staff
like sample profile file is now missing. Programming Tools chapter
is very decent with clear explanations that you will be hard-pressed
to find elsewhere. Sysadmin chapter also contain some information
that is difficult to find elsewhere. But of course it cannot replace a book
on Solaris administration and it was not intended to.
- The second part is reference. Starting from page 682 is an alphabetical
command reference that could easily stand on its own as a separate book.
It's actually pretty competitive with O'Reilly Unix in a Nutshell and I
prefer Sobell's second part to them. There's also a superior index and thoughtful
appendices on various flavors, regular expressions and GUIs. As any reference
it is sometimes too close to man pages, but unlike many competitors it always
contains examples -- a sad omission in the original Unix man
pages and BTW O'Reilly Unix in the Nutshell books.
- As for shortcomings there are very few of them and they generally does not
diminish the high value of the book. For some reason nawk and sed are covered
not in the main chapters, but only in the reference part. I would change
this is a future edition. Grep and find probably also can be covered a small
separate chapter after chapter 10 along with more material on regular expressions.
Backup is also covered pretty superficially and this is another are were the
book can be improved. I doubt about wisdom of covering two shells in an introductory
book, but C shell is more user friendly and ksh is more widely used in commercial
environment, so the author was definitely hard pressed to cover both.
-
- Perl is not mentioned at all but in practice Perl killed shell scripting
in all but simple and special purpose (startup) cases. And although the decision
whether to include Perl chapter or not should probably be better left to the
author (it complicates the book as as such has some drawbacks too), I think
that it make sense to provide a supplement with Perl overview.
- The author web site is www.sobell.com.
You can
read an Amazon interview with Mark G. Sobell.
????
Unix Complete (Complete) ~ Usually ships in
24 hours-
Peter Dyson,
Stan Kelly-Bootle / Paperback / Published 1999
Amazon price: $15.99 ~ You Save: $4.00 (20%)
- 1008 pages 1st edition
Sybex, Inc.; ISBN: 078212528X
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 303,861
A very good price for 1K well written pages ;-). Well known authors. Stan Kelly-Bootle
(skb@crl.com) -- a famous author of
Understanding Unix and
The Computer Contradictionary
Table of contents-
-
Good Reference Book, June 29, 2000
Reviewer:
josh_g (see more about me) from st louis, mo United States
This book, I have found, is not especially conducive to reading straight through.
However it serves my purposes as a reference tool quite well. The last 500 pages
are nothing but explanations of the (most) commands available in UNIX. There
are very few examples in this area of the book though. Overall, page for page,
I think you'll find this book gives you the most quantitative and qualitative
information for your buck.
- ****
Teach Yourself Unix in 24 Hours, Second Edition
- by Dave Taylor, James C. Armstrong Jr.
- Our Price: $15.99
Paperback - 529 pages 2nd edition (January 1999)
Sams; ISBN: 0672314800 ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.33 x 9.21 x 7.48
Author
web site
-
Table of Contents
- Amazon.com Sales Rank: 10,028
Avg. Customer Rating: ****+
Number of Reviews: 22
-
Excellent UNIX Book, June 29, 2000
Reviewer:
Theresa London (see more about me) from St. Joseph, MO USA
When I first learned UNIX 8 years ago, there were't any books available - it
