Slashdot Mirror
The UNIX Systems Administration Handbook
Introduction
There are a few books which most sysadmins will mention in hushed tones when discussing reading material, and one of those is the famous "Red Book", the second edition of this book (the new edition's purple). I'd heard good things about it ever since people actually started paying me to do systems admin rather than just mucking about with computers for fun, so when the new third edition came along, I was keen to take a look at it.
The book aims to cover the basics in a wide range of areas that good UNIX admins need to know about. The contents range right through from booting the system and adding disks to dealing with users and the inevitable people-politics that help make the job so . . . varied and exciting. While the second edition covered six commercial versions of UNIX, the new edition has simplified this and now covers two commercial UNIX systems (Solaris 2.7 and HP/UX 11.00) and two free operating systems (Red Hat Linux 6.2 and FreeBSD 3.4), which accurately reflects the changes in the UNIX world since 1995. The last edition also came with a CD full of useful tools, but there's no such companion to the new edition -- near-universal Internet access for sysadmins has made such things far less useful than they used to be.
What's Bad?The big shock upon getting hold of a copy of this book is the price tag. Here in Ireland, it's going for about IR£68 in shops, and the U.S. list price is $68. This is a lot to pay for a book, and to my mind it's quite likely to put off a number of potential readers. I can understand the price tag -- with four principal authors and 850 pages of dense information it's bound to be costly, but it's a shame that it had to be quite so expensive. Online it's available for about US$55, but that's still not cheap.
It should also be made clear right from the start that this is not a book for newcomers to UNIX. Don't look here if you're wondering how to list files or send mail -- there are plenty of books out there already that cover those areas more than adequately. The book assumes that the reader is already familiar with UNIX from a user's point of view.
What's Good?When you get down to actually reading the book, though, it's immediately apparent that the authors really know their stuff. It's a book written from the perspective of people who know what it's like to be a sysadmin in the trenches. They have opinions that are obviously derived from painful experience, and aren't nervous about sharing them when the need arises -- if they think something sucks, they make damn sure you know about it. The information density is remarkably high for such a fat book, and the writing has a light touch which makes it extremely readable both as a desk reference and as bedtime reading. The advice given is sensible and solid, and I found myself nodding in agreement with the authors at some points, while feeling somewhat chastised and guilty at other points for not having done some of the things suggested. The humour helps to keep the book readable rather than getting in the way as it could easily have done.
As with all good computer books, there are cartoons (drawn crudely but funnily by Tyler Curtain) scattered through the book. My favourite is on the subject of "Co-operating With Windows." It involves, well, brides, rednecks and shotguns, something with which anyone who's ever gone through the pain of trying to make Windows machines play nicely in a UNIX environment will identify.
Things that only need a short chapter to cover the essentials (Web serving, for instance) aren't bogged down with extraneous detail, while the areas that always inspire fear among sysadmins (print services, DNS, mail ... ) are covered in all the necessary depth. Each chapter ends with a section of pointers to further information for those needing to know more than is covered in the book. The information is of high quality and feels very reliable, making it a good guidebook for those trying to find their way through the world of confusion, vendor-specific idiosyncrasies and divided loyalties that is UNIX administration.
So What's In It For Me?If you're just interested in the basics of how to keep your Linux system running smoothly, you'd probably be better served by O'Reilly's "Running Linux" or any of the myriad similiar works out there. On the other hand, if you're starting out in system administration, or if you're an experienced sysadmin with anything less than universal guru status, this is a splendid book. The price is high, but if you're really serious about your work it's definitely money well spent -- think of it as an investment in your career.
Besides, with forewords from Linus Torvalds, Eric Allman, Marshall Kirk McKusick and Dennis Ritchie, who am I to argue? The only reason I've given it nine instead of ten out of ten is the price. To summarise -- I wish I'd read this book five years ago.
Table of Contents- Where To Start
- Booting And Shutting Down
- Rootly Powers
- Controlling Processes
- The Filesystem
- Adding New Users
- Serial Devices
- Adding A Disk
- Periodic Processes
- Backups
- Syslog And Log Files
- Drivers And The Kernel
- TCP/IP Networking
- Routing
- Network Hardware
- The Domain Name System
- The Network File System
- Sharing System Files
- Electronic Mail
- Networking Management And Debugging
- Security
- Web Hosting And Internet Servers
- Printing
- Maintenance And Environment
- Performance Analysis
- Cooperating With Windows
- Policy And Politics
- Daemons
- Colophon
- Index
Purchase this book at ThinkGeek.
I wonder, how does the reviewed book compare to "essential unix system administration" by Frisch/O'Reilly? I found the O'Reilly book rather good.
I would recommend both. I use the Red Book (now the purple book) as the textbook for my class on Unix System Administration at Washington State University. However, I really like the Frisch book, and in fact, the way it presents info fits my thinking better. But, by emphasizing one topic at a time, the Nemeth book fits a class situation better, and makes a better reference book.
I like the new edition. And it is so nice this semester not to need to explain all the points where the book was badly out of date (especially the chapters on sendmail and BIND).
My only beef with the Nemeth book is that it does not cover shell scripting. The Frisch book covers the basics of Bourne shell. If the Nemeth book covered Bourne shell, it would be perfect for my class. As it is, I still use it, and just cover shell scripting separately.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers. -- Pablo Picasso
>ln -s /usr/bin/su /usr/bin/god
/" > /usr/bin/noclip
>echo "#!/bin/sh\n\nsudo chmod -R a+rw
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
I happen to have a copy of the 2nd edition (the red book), and have found it immensely useful and valuable. Well worth the price, especially if you're in a job where you deal with a number of unix systems, or want to be a more accomplished sysadmin. Next to O'Reilly's Unix Power Tools, this book was probably one of the best investments I ever made.
imabug
"For I am a Bear of Very Little Brain, and Long Words Bother Me"
I will be the first to admit that when I paid 70 for it I was uhm less than enthused. I had bought
the previous 2 versions though and had found them
to be still useful guides when dealing with older
Unixs (SGI/Ultrix/OSF) that I would run into...
The extra $30 I paid for the 3rd edition is in the
depth they go into subjects that need to be done..
I retired 3 O'Reilly books this week after finding
the information not up to par with this book.
Personally I think every support engineer and sysadmin should have a copy of this book.
-- SJS smooge at smoogespace dot com
You're quite right, of course. What was really intended there was "It's good for reading a bit of while you're stuffing food into yourself after another 12-hour day at the office, prior to slumping unconscious onto the nearest reasonably flat surface, which may or may not be a bed".
Apologies for the confusion.
Yup, you're right -- I just wrote the review, and don't get anything from any sales of it as a result from Thinkgeek, Prentice-Hall or whoever. The Thinkgeek link was provided by /., not by me. The enormously positive review is simply because I love the book to bits, not for any other reason.
By the way: Since everyone seems to be comparing the Yellow/Red/Purple books to the Armadillo Book (Frisch) -- I've got that one too, but to my mind Purple has the edge over it because it fits my mindset better. Some other people may (and do, judging by other posts) find the opposite is true for them. And yes, props to the Drill Book as well -- I've had the first edition of that sitting on my bookshelf for a long time.
As an AC has already pointed out, the second edition covered Solaris back in 2.3/2.4 days, when it sucked a hell of a lot more than it does now. A lot of my job involves adminning Solaris, and the Solaris-related stuff in the third edition seems pretty accurate to me. Others more guruish than I may spot more errors, of course.
I have the Yellow Book (whatever edition that was -- if it's a first edition I'll have to hang on to it, eh?). Since I'm now two colors behind I guess I should get the Purple Book now? Especially since the Yellow Book was very BSD oriented, AT&T flavors were not covered too heavily, and some newer variants weren't mentioned at all. (I think the Yellow edition came out before Linus finally got fed up with Minix. :-) )
But US$70+??!! I think I paid about US$30 for the Yellow version.
--
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
In my experience, the most competent Linux users were good SunOS, AT&T UNIX, SCO, or *BSD users. Good logic is timeless, as the *NIX model of command processing.
I know this one is going on my bookshelf.
aÍÍ©ÍÌÍ£Ì'̽ͩÌÍzÍYÌÍÌY
"UNIX System Administration Handbook" is one of the few books that I consider essential to my job. I bought a copy for myself, and then I got my employer to buy one to add to my ever-growing professional library here at work. The book really is that useful.
The best thing about the book, to me, is the way the authors tell it to you straight. There is very little of the usual mealy-mouthed cow-towing to the Almighty Producers of Computer Products here. Instead, readers get the benefit of the authors' considerable experience and knowledge, unfiltered.
If you're an admin and don't have this book, buy it. You'll need many other books, too, but there's no way your library can be complete without this one.
The biases against Solaris were one of my main focuses when reviewing this book. It was always a major source of contention and a big reason why I didn't recommend the previous edition to Solaris admins.
That being said, I submitted quite a bit of corrections in this area, and I'm pleased to say that the new edition is much fairer towards Solaris.
Also the original poster wasn't quite correct. The new edition covers many Solaris 8 issues as well. (although it doesn't go as in-depth as any general sysadmin book into nitty-gritty Solaris specifics).
Why if you own the second edition are you buying the third edition? Is there anything available about RedHat or BSD that could not be found out somewhere else? The point of buying this book is to get the idea of what sys admiuning should be and then there are examples regarding certain distros. The examples aren't the important part.
Devil Ducky
Devil Ducky
MY peers would get out of jury duty.
This is be an excellent book. I started an ISP in 1994 with eight modems, two 386s, twenty Linux floppy disks and the first (yellow) edition of this book. I don't do much admin any more but I think I'll get it anyway just because it's a good read. Technical writing needs more literate authors like these guys (and the illustrations are good too).
I taught a chapter out of the 2nd edition, and thumbed through the rest of the book.
It was so rife with factual errors about Solaris that I had to recommend against reading the book.
So is the 3rd edition still this bad?
I've been told Casper Dik (Solaris deity) met Evi Nemeth (coauthor of this book) once. I was told that approx every other sentence out of her mouth was about how much she hated Solaris.
Granted, Sun and Solaris aren't perfect, but that's no excuse to make up things about how bad they are. That's the sort of thing that creates backlash.
Is "Essential UNIX administration" (O'Reilly). That's the one with the armadillo on the cover. Can't remember the name of the author, but it's probably easier to read for newbies than the famous 'Red Book'.
A company I worked for had two (count them, two!) copies of the Red (now Purple) book -- and they were required reading for anyone who wanted to have anything to do with UNIX. And the main sysadmin kept one on his desk at all times!
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
The O'Reilly book is quite good indeed. This is even better. More importantly, though, it's different--it goes at things from a different angle, and one may present it in a way that you 'get' better than the other.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
He didn't say Red Hat was not a commercial company, he said it wasn't a commercial OS. Learn to read.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Sorry, boyo, the OS itself is not commercial. They can, and do, sell it commercially, but it's not a commercial product. A fine distinction, but a distinction none the less. By the way, in this case specifically, when you 'buy' RH, you're buying manuals and support and the convenience of a CD.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
The words I used is "good start", I didn't say one would become a guru system admin or even a decent system admin, but reading books and learning about the system is the best way IMHO to start.
Try something. Pick a unix command, ANY unix command and key it into your console. What did you type ls or pwd? it doesn't matter what you typed. Where did you GET this commands from?
Your memory. A admin requires fast thinking, I don't deny that. But they must also remember what does what, why and when to do it.
Once your remember a good chunck of commands and what they do, THEN and only then, after you have remember them can you use your fast thinking and logical problem sloving to use those commands in a productive manner.
It requires both.
Knowledge is food for the brain and it never did anyone harm. The more knowledge you have about a certain subject is a "good start"
"`Ford, you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.'" -THHGTTG
If this book is one of the Holy Books (apparently the Holiest of the Holy), what other gospels, commentaries, and books of faith on *nix would the community recommend?
I agree. It's pretty expensive, but luckily I found it at Borders for 30% off. :) So the book only ended up costing me about 45 bucks. Putting the cost aside, it's a pretty good book and they definately do know what they're talking about (the authors that is).
Actually, there was the Yellow book first, then the Red and now the Purple. I have the Yellow and Red as well as the O'Reilly and have to say Evi's book is better.
Snide remarks towards DeadRat? More than appropriate IMNSHO. Dead Rat is a great learning tool, but you wouldn't want to risk your business on it. Too wierd, too many bits missing.
That said, I seem to attract lots of newbies who want to be a unix admin when they grow up. I send them off to d/l the RedHat ISOs and run it up. I tell them that they should use it to learn, since loading new stuff is easy enough with the RPM thing, and it's well documented on the net.
I qualify that recommendation with the instruction that once they have it grokked, they need to fdisk/newfs and install Mandrake (or, if they're sufficiently clued newbies) FreeBSD. Mandrake's a good home PC or an economy class server. FreeBSD's business class.
When the newsbies come back clued, and start asking what books they should buy, I tell them The Red Book. I've never seen a better book on Unix Admin for the pre-clued. Never leave home without it.
My copy of the red book has travelled with me to Singapore, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, New Zealand (from Australia). It's more important to me than that pesky American Express card that every retailer on the planet hates!!!
Slightly different approach: When they ask about security, I send them out to buy:
1) The Red Book - good grounding in *nix for the pre-clued
2) The Crab Book (TCP/IP Net Admin - Hunt) - good for TCP/IP clues
3) The Cricket Book (DNS and Bind - Liu) - 'If something is wrong with your net connection, first check DNS, DNS, and then DNS'
4) 'Firewalls and Internet Security' - Cheswick and Bellovin. Needs no introduction. The network security bible. Brilliant teaching book.
5) 'Intranet Security' - Mccarthy - Usefull for putting fear of god (and thus extracting money) from management. Also an excellent grass roots 'this is what we're on about' for newbie security types...
My twenty-five cents...
Geoff
I find your ideas intriguing and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
I think it goes without saying that the Ultimate *Nix Systems Admin Handbook, heck, the Ultimate Systems Admin Handbook period, is the BOFH. (Also available here and here)
I think all of us can relate
Information is the catalyst for revolution
You know, as a sysadmin, I usually don't have time to sleep. And when I do have time, I usually don't need to read anything to help me get to sleep. And when I do need to read, the last thing I want is more stuff to do with my job! I'm in home and in bed to get away from lusers! Not to think about them some more!
For the humor-impaired: this posting has been a joke. Thank you.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
The RED Book revisted! Seriously, if you want to become a Unix admin, there are 4 books you must study.
1. The Red Book (this book second edition, I guess now it is the purple book)
2. The Blue Book (O'Rielly's Unix System Admin book)
3. The Small Book (The Unix Philosophy by Mike Gancarz published by Digital Press)
4. The Drill Book (O'Rielly's Unix Power Tools, picture of drill on front).
I think if someone can study and know everything in those books by memory, they will have a good start at unix admin-ing. Also need a good book on your unix of choice, the man pages, and more than anything using the system.
The point being, this book is famous, it is a really good book and is required reading for anyone wanting to get into unix admin-ing.
I can't believe they changed the color! The 2 admin books where the red and blue books. Now it will be the purple and blue books, that isn't as catchy.
There is also a DOD red book on security and IBM produces a lot of "red books", so it gets confusing, but most admin know what you are talking about.
I paid I think $90 for this book at borders. It was worth it.
"`Ford, you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.'" -THHGTTG
I administrate a mixed shop of 70 or so systems: big HP-UX, Sun and AIX development machines with FreeBSD, Debian and a few stranger things running our infrastructure. Even tho the USAH only directly covers half the systems I have to handle, it lays down a solid groundwork =any= admin of =any= Unix system can benefit from.
The USAH saved my hash on more than one occasion, and it really bailed me out when I first wound up a professional Unix admin. You gotta realize, I'm a Mac guy...first computer was a Mac, I now write for an up-and-coming Mac webzine, and I carry my Powerbook around with me wherever I go.
So I was hired as the "IT Guy" by a small R&D company on the strength of my Mac skills. There were a dozen or so Macs in sales and marketing...and over 110 Sun workstations. From an old Sun 3 to a pretty monumental dual-UltraII clone, we had unix boxes running everything from our firewall and company web site to file servers and backup systems to circuit simulators and code compilers. As someone who's only experience to the comand line was a dial-in shell to get internet email, I was completely out of my league, and desparate to hold onto the job for reasons I won't get into here.
It was a =really= hairy situation, and I kept my head above water only because of this excellent book. Now I do the Unix thing as my main career, and use the Mac for fun and personal computing. I picked up O'Reily's Systems Administration Handbook, as well as Sun's own Solaris books, but they weren't anywhere near as concise or accurate as the USAH.
SoupIsGood Food
As a UNIX system administrator myself, I have to say that I have used the Red Book countless times, and it's saved me almost every time. I rarely have to look in another book (except perhaps the Frisch book, aka the "Blue Book," aka the "Armadillo Book"). What distressed me about this newest edition of the book is that they focus only on four OSs: FreeBSD, RedHat 6.2, Solaris 7, and HP-UX 11.00. While these are perhaps representative of the most popular UNIXes out there presently (with the exception of perhaps AIX), the authors made the conscious decision not to cover all of the OSs they had done before. The second edition, for instance, went over Solaris 2.4, HP-UX 9.0, IRIX 5.2, SunOS 4.1.3, DEC's OSF/1 2.0 (which is now Compaq Tru64), and BSD/OS 1.1.
For system administrators who are interested in supporting legacy systems, the Red Book (or, more specifically, the Second Edition) is still useful. I, for instance, needed to know how IRIX set up their /etc/exports or /etc/dfs/dfstab equivalent, and I was able to find it in seconds in the Red Book. No longer.
Otherwise, having now read the Purple Book cover to cover, I can recommend it heartily. It has the same style, flavor, and philosophy which has made the Red Book invaluable to me in the past, and I suspect that I'll be carrying around the Purple Book for years to come. Go buy it.
Note also that you can find /.'s review of the Red Book here, if you're curious.