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Linux Books Media Software Book Reviews

Learning GNU/Linux: The Survey Course Continues 49

Posted by timothy from the why-don't-you-try-w.h.-smith-instead?! dept.
Madman Chromatic (coder, writer, thinker) sheds even more light on the books lurking on store shelves designed to lure, and then snare, new or uncertain users into trying out -- and actually enjoying! -- this wacky "Linux thing." This time around, the texts he's chosen cover the topics of installation and day-to-day operation of a Linux system in greater depth than the Dummies series dares to, but they're still aimed squarely at competent, literate users rather than only at technical gurus. Read on for his insights into Using Linux, Linux Configuration & Installation, and the Linux Essential Reference.

Various Introductory and Reference Books
author (Varies by title)
pages n/a
publisher (Varies by title)
rating n/a
reviewer chromatic
ISBN (Varies by title)
summary Three books intended to provide clear guidance and reference to the Linux sysadmin
*

This week's edition takes a look at three very different books. We have tutorials, theory and techniques, and thick juicy slabs of opts. Step through instructions and stay on the sidewalk, get your hands dirty on your own if you're the trailblazing type, or read up on what you always thought someone should code, if you're stuck at your desk.

Title (Author) Using Linux (Jack Tackett, Jr / Steven Burnett)
Publisher, ISBN QUE, 0789717468
Included Stuff none
Intended Audience RedHat users.
Scope Installation and basic introduction to Linux.
Technical Correctness Occasional weird advice. (In one spot, the authors describe a very insecure PATH setting without explaining that it's dangerous.)
Writing style Varies with chapter author.
Other Two-thirds of the way through the book, there are a number of mildly annoying typesetting errors. Unfortunately, they tend to appear near literal command-lines. Hopefully this will be corrected in a second edition.

Using Linux is a cross between a reference-book and a tutorial. Each chapter takes a different subject (Networking, Working with Hard Drives) and breaks it up into common tasks -- each listed in the copious table of contents and the large index. For example, if you're interested in setting up a file system, you can flip right to page 495 and choose between the RedHat tool or editing /etc/fstab yourself. Though RedHat tools receive a lot of attention, they're not presented as the only way to get things done. In a pinch, you'll find command line equivalents for common tasks given near the graphical description.

Accompanying the chapter text are occasional sidebars. These label figures, give a bit of historical perspective, and dish out useful tidbits of information that don't fit into the normal flow. This is less distracting than the usual approach of goofy icons and inset boxes often found in other books.

What's nice about this book is that it covers more subjects than most of the others. It's thick, but not unreasonably so. It's easy to read, but packed with details. Instead of covering only the handful of things every (home) user will need, the authors add information about removable drives, fax configuration, and file system cleanup, to name a few topics. Also nice is a brief chapter on building installations from source code (both make and Imake style systems) -- there's another world out there beyond RPM.

The task-oriented approach doesn't spend much time on theory, preferring a gentle overview and usage specifics. Obviously, there's more to learn than what's presented, but people more interested in results will prefer this decision. The system administration section really stands out, for an introductory book, and the appendix listing common Linux commands and glossary of terms will come in handy.

All things considered, this is a solid book. The breadth of information is good, and the flow of topics means it's readable from start to finish. Occasional flaws detract slightly, but they're not fatal.

[You can purchase this book at FatBrain.]

Title (Author) Linux Configuration & Installation (Patrick Volkerding, Kevin Reichard, Eric Foster-Johnson)
Publisher, ISBN M&T Press, 0764570056
Included Stuff Slackware 3.5 CD-ROM, with extra disk full of additional programs.
Intended Audience The do-it-yourself type. No prior Unix knowledge is necessary, though some experience with the command line will come in handy.
Scope Installation and introduction to Slackware. Very good overview of the general Linux way to do things.
Technical Correctness Quite good.
Writing style Easy to read, though still technical.
Other The version reviewed is the 4th edition -- somewhat dated (1998), but not out of touch. If there's a newer edition, get it! If not, you won't go astray with this one.

With help from Patrick Volkerding (Slackware creator) himself, this book teaches the do-it-yourself distribution. Expect a tremendous amount of detail -- in the first chapter alone, there are dozens of links to a Web site for more information about Linux and particular hardware. Fully half the book falls under installation and initial configuration issues, though this includes tinkering with your window manager, setting up networking, and recompiling your kernel (topics usually saved for later in other books). The fourth edition added a section on Slackware and portable computing, with pages of links to information on particular laptop models and information on synchronizing your Palm Pilot.

Chapter seven introduces the command line (though people following along will have used it -- with gentle prodding). It's a whirlwind, 50-page tour that explains a bevy of tools and tricks both concisely and thoroughly enough for day to day work. Following that are applications -- text editors, text formatters, graphics viewers, and the like. A short section on system administration covers scheduling, managing accounts, checking performance, but relatively little about security. Finally, chapter ten delves in to Linux programming -- toolkits, languages, tools, and scripts. Maybe the hors d'ouvres will whet your appetite to learn more, or at least help you with the magic "./configure; make; make install;" incantations.

The appendices list additional sources of information and the contents of the CD-ROM. Don't overlook the supplemental information, either -- including 30 pages of extra package description. (If you're going to install Slackware yourself, you ought to know what you need and what additional options there are.)

The only reason to overlook this book is its age, which is a shame. Things haven't changed so much that the knowlege presented is obsolete -- considering that the hands-on Slackware approach often leads to true and deep understanding. Unless you're too intimidated to experiment, you can learn a great deal, even from a two-year-old text.

This book is eminently readable. Readers with some technical background will appreciate the slightly geeky, no nonsense approach, while users new to Unix in general will benefit from the quality explanations. When the publishers see fit to release a 5th edition of this book, it deserves very serious consideration.

[You can purchase this book at FatBrain.]

Title (Author) Linux Essential Reference (Ed Petron)
Publisher, ISBN New Riders,
Included Stuff none
Intended Audience Users and administrators already comfortable with the command line.
Scope Common and uncommon commands and switches. If you can imagine a task, it's likely listed here in glorious detail.
Technical Correctness Good.
Writing style Reference style -- very concise, little prose. Not something you'd read straight through. Trust me.
Other The organization by topic here is nice. I've used it a few times already, just to look up something I knew had a command option somewhere.

For the user already familiar with shell basics, running programs, and using 'shutdown' instead of flipping the switch, a reference of commands and options might come in handy. That's the idea behind Linux Essential Reference. If you already know what you want to do but not how to do it, flip to the appropriate section and discover all of the little timesavers and niceties you've always wanted but never knew existed.

What sets this book apart from other works, including the man and info pages, is the excellent organization. Not only are commands grouped by category, the sections are (roughly) arranged according to complexity. (Although if you're not familiar with cd, mv, cp, and at least pico before looking something up, get thee to a tutorial!) For example, the Kernel chapter subsections are, in order, 'Installing New Kernels', 'Using Modules', 'Device Files', 'The /proc Filesystem', and 'Kernel Message Logs.'

Rather than reformatting man pages, the author has gone to quite a bit of work, rewriting often terse descriptions into longer examples. This is helpful with the lesser-known options (ls -T 4). The amount of detail, more than in any other work, makes this a good reference. (If you do read it all the way through, you'll have something to put on your technical reviewing resume.)

As seems to be usual, this book is divided into a user section and an administrator section. Administration gets a stronger treatment here, with information on LAN-specific tools. It's not limited to the home user's point of view, which makes it more useful to system administrator-types. The security chapter, including tcpwrappers and ipchains configuration, stands out as informative, though brief.

This book answers the question, "Okay, now what?" If you're feeling experimentative after polishing off one of the others, but you want a little more direction than the command prompt usually provides, having this book on your desk will prove valuable.

[You can purchase this book from ThinkGeek.]
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Learning GNU/Linux: The Survey Course Continues More

Learning GNU/Linux: The Survey Course Continues

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  • Best Linux book I ever bought was "Running Linux" published by O'Reilly. Really good book, and even if it's getting old and sorta outdated (it's pre-KDE) it's still useful for knowing what all the entires in all the little config files mean.
  • Is there room in the Slashdot Cruiser to carry all these books?

    Will the additional weight of the books overstress the engine? Will I have to turn off the air conditioner when I'm driving uphill?
  • Now be it I'm not the most alert person, but why did I see that two of those include Slackware? I thought they'd kinda fallen in the market, and usually going with the best of the market will make you the best of the market in books...

    Although, it is nice to see something other than RedHat.. (yes, I run RedHat.. go ahead and flame me, you would either way I had it..)

  • well (Score:1)

    by knurr ( 161310 )
    I am glad to see people suporting the Penguin
  • I wouldn't say that the SAMS "Unleashed" series of books are the best I ever read but as for a refrence for Linux commands and explanation of config files and the such it is an excellent book to have by your side. I highly recommend the Linux Programming and the SuSE Linux Unleashed (or whatever your flavor of Linux happens to be).

  • Best Linux Book (Score:3)

    by bfree ( 113420 ) on Tuesday August 29, 2000 @05:55AM (#819677)
    My favourite (by miles) was and is "Running Debian GNU/Linux" by Bill McCarty (published by O'Reilly). Not only is this a great introduction to the GNU OS which comes with Debian GNU/Linux (oh well I guess slink is finally out of date...a bit better than all those RedHat 5.2 and 6.0 books out there though) but it is also published under the Open Publication License [opencontent.org]. Not a for dummies book, I'd be far happier to give this to a dummy than any for dummies book I have ever seen. It Rocks

  • My favorite (Score:3)

    by pac4854 ( 130343 ) on Tuesday August 29, 2000 @06:10AM (#819678)
    The most enjoyable Linux book I've glommed thus far has got to be Nicholas Wells' "Linux: I didn't know you could do that...". It's got some fifty or so tips and tricks for Linux, plus RPMs and .tgzs for the examples in the book. Lots of useful info, like undeleting files, playing music, etc. While not "dumbed down" by any means, it would still be a good read for the clueful Win9x user wanting to play around with Linux.
  • The best book I found for people just starting out is Mark Sobell's "A Practical Guide to Linux." His book assumes that you have a working system and teaches you how to use it. It emphasises the command prompt, so it doesn't have much on X, but I found it invaluable for helping me get the basics down - chron, vi, ls, less, cat, grep, tar, etc. A lot of the HowTo documents and man pages made a lot more sense to me after I read this book.
  • Because it has no packaging/configuration system. On a mature production system a packaging/configuration system is a virtue. On a system where people learn it is a hassle.

    So for learning linux Slackware is still the most superior distro. You can break and fix things as you wish and the system will not be 100% broken. Also Slackware still uses ancient BSD style startup, not SysV. This is much easier to understand, debug and fix.

  • all those RedHat 5.2 and 6.0 books out there though

    Compare and contrast the UK experience on things...
    When I first bought a copy of Linux (didn't have a spare T1 kicking about and 650MB is a looong wait on 56K), I had to go to about 4 shops before I found it.
    Browsing the same shops last week (Tottenham Court Rd), I saw release of Corel, SuSe, RedHat and Mandrake. And where there were _no_ books before, there was a good 25% of the shelf space taken up by Linux Howto... style books, by all major publishers... Gathering momentum as we speak!

    Strong data typing is for those with weak minds.

  • I've personally never found Linux books (or any computer books for that matter) to be terribly helpful. It's probably the way I learn, but I find it much easier either getting a geek friend to teach you, going on a course (if you can find one that isn't too much BS) or just learning by experimentation. Asking around in newsgroups also helps, as long as the question isn't tooo dumb :)
  • I recently bought Running Linux - Second Edition by Matt Welsh and Lar Kaufman. Despite being 4 years old, if it was as good as i'd heard, i figured it might still be relevant. Failing that, it might at least provide a few good laughs (it was also super cheap).
    Although I have it finished it yet, most of what i have read seems to be general enough to avoid obsolescence. However, when Welsh delves into system specifics, the book's age becomes immediately apparent.

    "You should have at least 2 MB of RAM; however, it's strongly suggested that you have 4 MB."

    "...an 8-MB swap partition should suffice."

    "You can run a complete system with all of the bells and whistles in 80 MB or less."

    ...So it's a tad out-dated, but for AUS$20 it was a bargain, and i'm learning a hell of a lot. The erroneous specs (by today's standards anyway) seem to be only locate in the chapters on installation.

  • It sounds like at least one of those includes comprehensive information on rolling your own distribution, which is quite handy if you have to roll your own distribution. That would pertain to just about any company doing Linux appliances, and other companies or people might also want to do this.
  • (I'm using Slackware and I like it very much, so I'm probably biased)

    Slackware is the most "Unix" Distribution I know of. It has no such specialized things like a YaST, apt-get or rpm. It's also much slicker than the scripts found in a SuSE-Distribution.

    Probably that's why it's included in most of the books.

    Although I hear you say: "What? No package-manager? Are you crazy?" There ARE packages for Slackware and they do work very well. Check http://www.linuxmafia.org.

    Besides, it's one rock solid Linux-Distribution.

  • They were just giving it a category; none of the books reviewed were entitled either "Learning GNU/Linux" or "Learning Linux".

  • I had a rather unhappy experience with (and haven't resolved, yet, just pretty much threw in the towel) RedHat changes from 4.* to 5.*, I believe regarding tio or termio (I forget and don't have it in front of me) which was going toward BSD compliance. I had to pick up a few O'Reilly books which detailed this matter in greater depth. Albeit it's rather late for something of this nature to be published, were there any books published on these differences?

    Vote [dragonswest.com] Naked 2000
  • The third edition is even better.
  • Although Linux is all english, or at least most of it, there are lots of people I know of who want to try it but are scared away, because they fear not understanding the manuals. SuSE (though not being my favourite distro) is still translating the kernel-config, glibc and the man-pages. They really have done a good job up to now (judging the translations).

    There also are numerous books in german over a wide range. Books for beginners and for the more experiences Penguinista.

    My first book was "Linux" written by Marc-André Selig (Markt & Technik Verlag). It talks about installation of Slackware, Debian, SuSE and Red Hat and it gives the newbie a crashcourse in using the bash. Quite sufficient for a start.

    The next book was "Linux Intern" (Data Becker Verlag). This book comes with a Slackware on CD but also talks about installing other distributions. I don't recommend this book for the total clueless newbie because beside installation topics it also discusses the internal structure of I-Nodes or devicedrivers and the like. I have yet read it twice but still do not understand everything written in it. =:-)

  • Re:Why do they include Slackware?? (Score:4)

    by Legolas-Greenleaf ( 181449 ) on Tuesday August 29, 2000 @06:55AM (#819690)
    hmph... actually, slackware does have a packaging system. (i'm a slackware bigot running 7.1). It uses files in the .tgz format, and can be made to include installation scripts. Slackware comes with tools to build, install, and remove them (installpkg, makepkg, pkgtool), as well as a neat little tool for converting RPMs to the slackware format - rpm2targz ... i've been playing with packages somewhat recently because i managed to mangle my previous (slackware) install by playing with XFree86 4. Slackware format packages seem to be quite a bit easier to build then RPMs.

    My slackware machine is a 486/50, so slack really impresses me over Redhat and such because it's relivitely small, even fully installed. Also, coming in disk sets, it's easy for me to leave out KDE and associated tools, or LaTeX and install it later (instead of having to find it in a huge list, as is the case with Redhat). According to securityfocus [securityfocus.com] (whose page layout makes baby Jesus cry), it seems to be one of the more secure Linux distros out there. Finally, as noted by the parent poster, the BSD-style startup scripts are nice.
    -legolas

    i've looked at love from both sides now. from win and lose, and still somehow...

  • Hi Troll (or is it flamebait merchant),
    yes in many ways I really am that much of a RMS suckhole, I belive in Free software.

    I have in turn a question to ask you, what software are you going to recompile with your bcc32? Is it going to be a commercial unix or a "Linux" distribution? If it is a linux distribution you can delight in running a non-gcc system but you will still be running GNU/Linux. I think the point of GNU/Linux (as opposed to Linux) is extermely valid as only a very, very, very few people would ever run a system featuring Linux without GNU tools (maybe a linux router project or the like). If you are going to do a slackware/BSD style compile from source just check how many of those packages/projects/files come from the GNU project. I'd sure be interested to hear all about the system you are going to put together sans-GNU.
  • Its kind like of a chicken/egg situation. I find that the HOWTO's of the world and www.deja.com are the best source of information for me. This way, I get to hear about whatever problems other people in similar situations faced and what remedies were used for that problem. However, if I can't get my internet access going, then what follows is an endless cycle of dual-boots between Windoze and Linux. Mind you that the HOWTO's on the distro CD's are a good start but a lot of times, I had questions that I only found answered on deja.com.

    On another topic, (I know I'm off topic here), most Linux systems are pretty good at initial installation and almost always I get a working system without any major problems. Wouldn't it be a good idea if the system remembered what kernel options were used, so that when I'm about to build a new kernel (because I want to add a new feature or for some other reason), I shouldn't have to start from scratch. Am I missing something? What ends up happening is that I go from an initially installed working system to trying to recompile a kernel which I can't find the right options for to get a working system. Can anything be done to make that part easier for newbies (myself included)?

  • Just as an FYI - O'Reilly has updated the text to include current desktop environments in their 3rd edition released this year. I agree that this is one of the best books out there to read cover to cover - it explains the whats, but also the hows and whys of topics. I believe you have a much better understanding of how to manage the OS rather than respond to the OS. Other books I have read seem to gloss over the concepts and just spit out robotic procedures. Little learning there for me. I want commands in context.
  • Yeah, the book is kinda outdated, but I still
    consider it "the book" that really turned me
    onto the power of Linux and what I could do
    with the system. I haven't looked at the 3rd
    edition, but I would recommend it to anyone
    who is curious about Linux.
  • I've got Red Hat 6.0 Unleashed, and I have been mildly disappointed with it. I know it's hard to keep a printed book up-to-date with the latest information, but the repeated references to the HOW-TOs seem almost to say, "We the authors are too busy to update our book; you just spent $40 on pointers to free electronic references that will give you the real skinny!"

    Jeff

  • As a linux newb I bought and read several books to help guide me. Some of you may only touch How-Tos but many of us less l33t need a good old fashioned reference book to assist learning.

    The No BS Guide to Linux [fatbrain.com] - This book is a great introduction to the commandline interface. Nothing much on X, but everything you need to find your way around a shell.

    Idiot's Guide to Linux [fatbrain.com] My favorite book. Manuel Ricart wrote this excellent guide to running X on linux with emphasis on KDE. Good tips on backing up, security, and other basics that many books take for granted.

    Teach Yourself KDE 1.1 [fatbrain.com] Simply a good guide to learning how to fully use KDE. Each lesson is simple and focused, allowing those that need to learn in short amounts of time a concise lesson.

    Apache Server for Dummies [fatbrain.com] A straightforward book on configuring Apache. It's not meant as a handbook for a business, more as a way for someone to understand and configure Apache for the first time to understand the concepts behind the software. It allowed me to get a server up and running and even running CGI scripts for intranet use.

    If you are already a GNUGod, you won't need these books. But if you are like me and trying to learn these things without the benefit of live human tutor, these books are handy.

    Also, the two of the books deal mainly with KDE. If you like Gnome, bewarned that Idiot's Guide to Linux [fatbrain.com] deals mainly with KDE and not Gnome.

  • Quite so. I wonder if anybody sells USENET archives on CD for cheap (e.g. comp.os.linux.setup might be especially relevant); something like that, plus a decent interface to grep, might be quite helpful to users.

    It's been a while since I built a kernel, but if memory serves, you can build off the previous configuration if you

    a) patch the kernel rather than unpacking a full new .tgz (or probably just copying .config to the new directory)

    and

    b) 'make oldconfig'
  • Using Linux by Bill Ball and Que publishers is a great book for refrence. Its not much in the way of a read from begining to end or for the new user, but in the refrence dept, I love it. I find my myself going between this and Linux little black book of configuration quite a bit. Direct to the point and chock full of good information. If you get a chance, check either one of them out.
  • looking for an O'Reilly book on squid -- why the hell isn't there one specifcally for it?

    Anyway, I knew Linux had entered pop culture when I saw the book entitled: Linux! I Didn't Know You Could Do That... [barnesandnoble.com]. As if the title wasn't bad enough, have a look at the cover [sybex.com]. I don't care what the cliche says -- I still want nothing to do with this book. It may have an animal on the front, but it ain't an O'Reilly...

    end comment */

  • I just bought the third edition, and it seems to be a pretty comprehensive overview and survey of the various things you might want to do with Linux and how to accomplish them. Now just to finish the book... :)
  • What I meant to say was where is the .config which was created during installation?? Because essentially I had a working system with all the options auto-detected during installation and I may want to tweak just one little option.

    It can be pretty daunting for a newbie to have to build a kernel from sratch. If you had a starting point, then you have a chance. What better starting point than the auto-detected, working kernel created during the installation?

  • It sounds like at least one of those includes comprehensive information on rolling your own distribution, which is quite handy if you have to roll your own distribution.

    Indisputable.

  • I just bought (er...2 or 3 weeks ago, that is..) The Idiots Guide To linux. It seems...limited in scope. I understand, it is after all an idiots guide, but I thought there would be a little more meat to it. I'm a first time user, and I'm a little lost as to which is the best guide for a newbie like myself. Ay suggestions?
  • I second that. It's slightly dated, but it is much clearer than any other linux book I've seen. And it is clear by virtue of good writing rather than by restricting itself to the trivial. It would be great if he came out with a new edition.
  • It appears I also need the idiots Guide to Spelling. No suggestions needed.
  • No way will you be able to get the kernel to compile with anything other than gcc/egcs. Believe me, I've tried.

  • I checked out that book from my local library and I thought it did what it set out to do pretty well. I've been using Linux for about 10 months now and the main thing I learned from it were the existence of several programs that I downloaded as a result of lookin through the book (the CD and book is a little outdated.) I wouldn't buy the book, but its worth a look for newbies who already have an idea of how to use their linux boxes (as it never goes indepth.)
  • I've used unix in my job for years. So I don't need a "Dummies" book which holds your hand through the command line. I'm comfortable with command lines, makefiles, shells etc... I've even hacked Makefiles from distributions to get them to compile on my system.

    But, for sysadmin type stuff, I'm lost. I've always relied on someone else. I just type:
    log_problem, wait an hour or so, and POOF magic, the phone rings and someone tells me the thing is fixed.

    So, now I'm dabbling in linux at home, and find I'm quite lost in the sysadmin type stuff. NIS? NFS? /etc/fstab, init.rc? Can someone explain what BSD vs SYS5 is and why folks are so argumentative about it...

    I can read man pages no problem. But if one can't remember the command or really has problems remember where a config files is kept, you're in trouble.

    Can someone recommend a book that fits this hole?

    Linux Essential Reference above looks like it might be close. Looking for other inputs though...
  • Exactly!
    I bought Redhat for Dummies (by Maddog) and it just went in one ear and out the other, I doubt it even went in an ear sometimes.
    It confused me so badly I ended up have to re-install Linux twice cause I screwed stuff up.
    Kinda sucked.
  • Don't worry about the spelling. An inability to spell will give you a veneer of authenticity as a techie :).

    If you are starting off, the manuals that come with the RedHat boxed set will give you a start. It helps in general if you have some familiarity with using a command line, in any other operations system.. VMS, dos, whatever.

    Books I thought were helpful..

    Red Hat Linux Unleashed, Sams publishing

    Running Linux, O'Reilly

    Learning Gnu Emacs, O'Reilly

    The book with the most potential as you get more familiar with the system is perhaps a reprint of all the Howto documentation. I have the "Red Hat Doctor LINUX, The complete Linux reference documentation" which I originally ordered from RedHat.

    I don't know if this book is still put out, and obviously the online howto get updated while the book does not.

    However, skimming all the howtos gives you an idea of what commands exist, what they are called, and a little of what they can do. I'm not suggesting you memorize them! With a little study, you will begin to see that the people who put *NIX together were suprisingly clever, and things have been constructed in a logical and workmanlike manner. There isn't much emphasis on flash or glitter.

    But Beware.. If you get good at using Linux, or any *NIX, (or VMS for that matter, though VAXes are not something you tend to find by accident these days) you might develop a contempt for the expensive cheezyness called windows. You will then be labeled a Zealot by those who think bill gates invented computers and al gore invented the internet.

    Don't say I didn't warn you :)

  • Running Linux (O'Reilly) really is a great book. I am a clueless newbie, but I am haveing fun with LinuxPPC on my Umax Mac Clone thanks to this book. I read it, didn't think it was telling me as much as I would like to know and then found that it has answers that help me to solve most of the problems I run into. I use it in conjunction with Linux in a Nutshell (also from O'Reilly) which provides a quick reference for most of the commands I've been learning.

    I'm teaching myself C, and was very frustrated when I couldn't execute the first program (Hello, World!) that I compiled... The file was there, but Bash was telling me it didn't exist! There it was in the "Commands" section of Running Linux -- some distributions don't put the current directory in the deafult path... So export PATH=$PATH:. did the trick... and then (drummroll) "hello" produced "Hello, World!" (well, it was exciting for me, but I guess you had to be there...)

    This experience lead me to explore .bash_profile and .bashrc... and, to make a long story short, I'm learning many new things every day, which keeps me happy.

    I highly recommend Running Linux but you have to take an experimental, acitivist approach to get the most out of it. Poke around your system, try things out -- you'll learn a lot and words that would otherwise be read and forgotten will become useful information. I hope you enjoy it as much as I am.
  • That's "having" fun. Sorry about the typo. Or, perhaps I meant "Halving" fun... I guess that depends on whether I'm in the "why the $@!# won't this %@$^%ing machine do what I want" phase or the "wow, I can make it do what I want and all this other stuff, too!" phase.
  • My first contact was through Slackware Linux Unleashed, in 1997. The company I worked in had bought the book, and one night I took it home to play with an old 486SLC I had. I have to say it did the job. Then again, I was already a techie with 13 years of C programming experience, and I did have fairly good Unix admin skill (Ultrix, UnixWare, SCO, some SysV).

    I can't remember what the distribution was labeled, but the kernel was 2.0.27.

  • Has anyone had any experience with Brian Ward's The Linux Problem Solver?

    The description says, "Plenty of books teach installation of Linux. But what to do once it's running and something goes wrong or doesn't function?"

    Any comments?

  • there weren't more responses to this post... Lotsa people 'round these parts are always griping about how not enough people run linux... too many people still on the dark side, etc... Well, now here's your chance to give those undecideds some advice...
    -heidiporn


  • "Running Linux" may be a good book, but I think there ought to be yet another book that lead people AWAY from M$-Windows.

    If I have the time, I would write that book, but (looking around the mess, and check the schedule) I am afraid I won't have that kind of free time until 2003 at the earliest.

    But anyway, this is my proposal for the title for that new book :

    Running AWAY from M$-Windows

    If anyone is interested in writing such a book, they are FREE (as in freedom) to use that title.

  • I remind you... not all beginners have an installed os... or an installed X... or know how to do either...
  • I am downloading mandrake 7.1 right now... will let you know how I fare with finding the config file created at install time and a subsequent kernel rebuild patched to the nth degree and still maintain a working system.
  • For info on creating Linux from scratch (or at least another distro to start out with, try going to Linux From Scratch [linuxfromscratch.org]

    Arun
  • also, Linus Torvalds wrote the forward for this book!!!

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I tell them to turn to the study of mathematics, for it is only there that they might escape the lusts of the flesh. -- Thomas Mann, "The Magic Mountain"

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