Unix books

[Ferg]

I've got some books from my dad who used to use unix alot... and i was just wondering how much of the information is relevant to the Redhat install i have installed.

The program the books refer to and the commands look very similar if not the same, I was wondering if anyone could tell me anything i need to look out for that will be completely different.

2 books that i'm told are really good by my dad are

TCP/IP Network administration, which says its examples are taken from SunOS 4.1.1, "based on System V Release 3.2"

And a book by Stephen Coffin called UNIX SYSTEM V RELEASE 4.

The tcp/ip book has an example sendmail config file for instance... which areas are likely to be totally different? :)

[Ferg]

Also... how much and easy to install/use would be a distrobution directly relevant to the books? :)

[Godin]

well, GNU/Linux itself (to use the propah name) is derived from System V UNIX, so the style of operation should be the same, and a lot of bits are the same across the *nix spectrum so I dare say most of it will apply, sendmail, hmm, that depends on how similar the config style is to the time it was written, and TCP/IP, bar v6 stuff,doesnt change much :)

[Ferg]

1337, ta Godin :)

[aef]

If the TCP/IP book is the O'Reilly one with a picture of a crab on the front, then it's a very good book - but it sounds like it's not the most recent edition, which has examples based on Linux as well. While TCP/IP itself may not have changed much, the config files and so on do vary between distributions.

As a general rule with Unix books, a lot of stuff (though not things relating to the kernel) are the same across flavours of Unix. So, use the books, but remember that things /can/ be different. In particular, you're likely to find some files in completely different places, which is where the 'locate' command is useful.

Essential System Administration (again, from O'Reilly) is also very good.

On the subject of "proper" names - yes, "Linux" is the name of the kernel, and most (almost all) Linux systems rely heavily on GNU tools. However, what any particular distribution is called is entirely up to the distibutor. The GNU license (GPL) itself gives people the right to redistribute the software without any restrictions as to what they call it. Accordingly, it might seem a little hypocritical for people to then complain about people doing exactly that. </rant>

AEF


[Edited by aef on 28-04-2001 at 10:19 PM]

[Godin]

I wasnt making any moan on that subject :) just thought I'd dust the name off for its once a year outing ;)

[aef]

Originally posted by Godin
I wasnt making any moan on that subject :) just thought I'd dust the name off for its once a year outing ;)

Sorry, Godin, that rant was aimed at the GNU people[1], not you :)

AEF

[1] They're half human and half gnu, kinda like out of a bad sci-fi film.