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Linux for Dummies, 5th Edition
Not everyone can Read The Fine Manual Wiley's "For Dummies" series tends to provoke polarized reactions, so here's fair warning: I love them more than I loathe them -- partly out of contrarianism, partly because I often fall well within their target demographic. If the folksy, self-deprecating tone of these books infuriates you as it does many people, most likely it's because you aren't part of the target audience. No one likes being talked down to. On the other hand, for many people who might otherwise be interested in switching to Linux (or at least playing with it more), being told to look at man pages is like being told to drive up a brick wall, and books like Linux for Dummies are a welcome resource both to learn from and to point out to others. (For more technically oriented novices and intermediate users, I might rather point out Jon Lasser's Think Unix! )
A series of bracketed command-line options (followed by terse explanations of what each one does) works perfectly, to those familiar enough to use them. Man pages are a great memory aid, reminder, and basis for experimentation ("Hmm, can I combine the -a and -v switches?"). What man pages aren't is consistently friendly and approachable; this book is. This is not a knock on man pages: the thing is, they're written by and for "computer people," which is not the same as everyone who wants to use a computer. Not everyone is a power-user, or wants to be, and on areas outside their usual domains, even power users can sometimes use a bit more hand-holding.
Promises, promises Linux for Dummies' back cover says it will teach the reader how to work with popular Linux distributions (specifically, Fedora, SUSE and Mandrake), choose an ISP and configure dialup access, understand bash syntax, install and use OpenOffice.org, and manage the Linux file system. It does all of these things, to a reasonable depth, but don't expect a heavy tutorial on any one of them: the whole point is naming and defusing common newbie problems. A DVD included with the book contains Red Hat's Fedora Core 1 and source code, making it a reasonable way to obtain that distro as well.LeBlanc is a good instructor; since she does computer training professionally, it's not surprising this book is organized well for self-directed learning, albeit at a pace that readers installing Gentoo on obscure hardware would likely find boring -- Chapter 6, 82 pages in, is titled "Dip in those toes." To be fair, by that point the book has zipped right through readying a system for and then installing a Linux distribution, and booting up for the first time. Not bad, really.
The early chapters leading up to that toe-dipping fulfill parts of the back cover's promises, by going through a graphical Fedora installation step-by-step (showing the user how to fill in each blank and go on to the next stage), then adding in the next chapter Mandrake- and SUSE-specific differences, emphasizing the similarities more than the idiosyncrasies.
The book's later chapters cover connecting to the Internet (via ethernet or modem), using a number of commonly included programs for email, web-browsing, word-processing and other workaday tasks, manipulating several types of files (for plaintext, this book leans understandably toward vi over emacs, but where are pine or joe?), navigating and lightly tweaking both GNOME and KDE, playing music and video files, and securing and updating one's system. Since there's clearly no way one book can address all of these things to the satisfaction of an advanced reader in 360 pages of text, don't look at the book that way: instead, the text provides a chatty overview of big issues (a few hundred words on why to avoid unnecessarily running as root, say), links to websites around the net for longer explanations, and skips completely religious wars about text editors, licenses, and proper window management.
When it comes to applications, this book is oriented toward desktop use; Apache doesn't even make the index. Chapters 7, 8 and 9 cover connecting to and using the Internet. Chapter 7 is all about the technical side of this -- setting up a working connection (with a friendly, necessary warning that not all modems, and not all ISPs, are equally adept at handling anything other than Windows), assigning IP numbers (or using DHCP) and using tools like traceroute to verify that things are working right. 8 and 9 cover various Internet tools, leaning toward Mozilla and Evolution for web-browsing and email, respectively. (Konqueror gets a one-line mention as a web-browser here, which is a bit short considering its strong KDE integration and dual life as a file browser.)
Working with file permissions and directories (both with and without a GUI) occupies Chapter 10, while 11 goes strictly into working from the command line. It's no In the Beginning Was the Command Line , but it does an admirable job of introducing the most necessary command line tools without straying into esoterica: things like ls, cd, pwd, man, clear and kill, in other words, the ones without which it would be hard to get around a system.
Chapter 14 is solely about using OpenOffice.org; it covers the drawing, presentation, spreadsheet, math and word-processing modules well enough to get started with each one. While there's a lot to be said for Abiword (clean, quick) and KOffice (frame orientation is very useful), OO.org is probably the most sensible office software to focus on in a book aimed at a non-expert audience. (And for the moment, anyhow, I find it the most compatible with Microsoft's office suite, which lends it considerable power in the form of network effects.) The chapter provided does as much justice to the suite, with lucid first steps outlined for common tasks like writing a text document and doing simple calculations with the Math module, as roughly 30 pages can be expected to.
By contrast, Chapter 18, devoted to securing one's system by way of passwords, network management and use of SSH, is only 13 pages long. (For the moment, that may be enough for this book, but I suspect by the next edition it won't be.) Still, quick but workable explanations of connecting from the Linux desktop to remote machines via ssh, and connecting Windows clients via ssh to your new Linux box, at least close some of the most obvious security holes, as does the advice to close down unneeded ports and daemons.
Screenshots throughout (cleanly printed greyscale) are well-chosen; this is one of the improvements that this edition has over the 1st edition I gave to my father a few years ago. Most of the screenshots reflect the author's choice of GUI programs over terminals, including graphical utilities for things like setting security options. By choosing Fedora's, LeBlanc sidesteps arguments about KDE vs. GNOME aesthetics -- since the images use the default Bluecurve theme (which looks just about identical under both of the most common windowing environments), I'm not even sure which environment was used to create most of them.
Two appendices close the book: the shorter (second) one lists the contents of the included DVD and system requirements; the longer one which precedes it provides a listing of common commands from alias to xxd (about which more below).
Along for the ride The included DVD is a compromise between audience (self-diagnosed computer dummies) and practicality (fitting six CDs' worth of Fedora into a book jacket with minimal fuss). The machine I set aside to play with Fedora doesn't have a DVD drive, so I used a standard download from Red Hat to play along with the examples. (I didn't bump into any contradictions between screen and page, but that's Situation Normal, since I used the same distribution.)
(Aside: though for various reasons Fedora does make a wise choice in a book like this, I hope future editions, or competing books in the non-expert-user niche, will use Live CDs such as Knoppix instead. That would open them up to users who want to mess around with Linux more before crossing their fingers and wiping a hard drive.)
There's one more freebie -- a single-sheet tear-out reference sheet listing common commands and a few of their options, including a list of the right commands to mount CDs under the Red Hat and Mandrake (identical) and SUSE (just slightly different enough to confuse). It only has to get used a few times to be worthwhile.
The gloss ceiling The same brief-and-breezy approach that makes the book worthwhile for some purposes (like not abandoning the audience) sometimes just makes it confusing; in several places the compromises necessary in boiling down a complex subject for a beginner audience made me itch to pencil in suggestions.
A few more pages worth of one-line summaries would have made the Appendix A, (the one on common Linux commands), far more valuable. As it is, LeBlanc lists a number of general categories (Printing, System Control, Communication, etc), summaries each category, and lists several built-in commands relevant to each.
Under the heading of 'Communication,' for example, she points out that sysadmins find the listed utilities "useful for providing information about users and communicating with them," then provides a handful of commands: finger, wall, write, and who. And while the section starts out with the advice to look up each command's man page if curious, this section strikes me as filler in its current configuration -- it could be struck to make more room discussing Live CDs, or vector drawing apps, or Mozilla's mail client as an alternative to Evolution.
Many applications are given short shrift simply because an adequate treatment of more window managers, graphics programs (two and a half pages dedicated to the GIMP is more than most programs get), music players and all the rest would have meant a far thicker book. I wish a few pages had been spared for at least capsule descriptions of pico and nano (my favorite text editors for Dummies -- err, "future experts" -- including me), Xchat, and gaim. Also on the wishlist: Wiley would commission LeBlanc to write a similar book aimed squarely at schools, in which applications like Scribus and some of the many Edutainment packages could be emphasized instead.
Since I've been dealing (arguing) with a wireless network in the time I've had this book, there's one other thing I wish this text didn't skip, which is a tutorial on connecting Linux systems via 802.11. The typical distro's autodetection abilities and set-up tools have improved to the point where this would be no more complicated to explain (and probably more useful) than the provided explanation of connecting through a modem.
The Upshot for Dummies Linux for Dummies isn't for everyone; it leaves out far more than it includes, leading to what would for advanced users be egregious omissions. However, for new, intermediate and merely rusty users, this book easily justifies its $30 pricetag -- as a confidence boost to the absolute beginner, and a refresher to everyone else. Linux, for various reasons of various worth, can certainly be cryptic (the same can be said of Windows and probably every OS under the sun), but a little bit of executive summarizing can inspire a would-be user, so he can actually enjoy and understand using it. Kudos to LeBlanc for providing that kind of catalyst.
You can purchase Linux for Dummies, 5th Edition from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, carefully read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Since I'm posting as an AC, I'll admit I used this book to start using Linux. It had good instructions to get it installed, and pretty good overview of things former Winblows users like me don't get (the / file system, for instance).
It wouln't help you to recompile the kernal, but will help you update GAIM.
Ctrl-Alt-F7
In a modern distro, such as Mandrake 10, SuSE 9.1 or Fedora Core 2 you will be SHOCKED how easy it is. You will be flamming people for spreading lies about Linux. Its true. The GNOME 2.6 and KDE 3.2 GUI's are so easy to use you will wonder how you got on without them!
So, if you haven't tried Linux or are using an old version, get one of these distros right away.
Just avoid distros like Debian or Slackware, they are optimized for the geek sector, and thats why there is a mis-conception, because there are too many people trying the wrong version of Linux!
I am typing this from Fedora Core 2, and my experience with it is incredible. Stable, Fast, Easy, FUN.
Download fedora here
Go here to learn how to install cool stuff such as Flash, Java, MP3, etc
It's Unixes. Stupid latin rules don't apply to proper nouns.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
> Please show me where Google can find (not provide, merely find) a tutorial as good as you will find in this or
> any introductary book
http://tldp.org
Next!
25% Funny, 25% Insightful, 25% Informative, 25% Troll
If you caught that much, I'm assuming you read it but your complaint merely seems like Linux zealotry to me.
Even the blurb on the front page states they're talking about techno savvy and your average user.
I have a friend I talked into using FreeBSD and while he is adept at navigating Windows and fixing some of his hardware conflict issues, he doesn't use Windows console commands whatsoever.
What most users know as commands are point and click options from menus, fully spelled out in whichever language their version of the OS is using.
Compared to that, I'd say yes, Unix like OS commands can be quite cryptic.
No sig for you!!
By the way, there are a lot of so called "professional" books by O'Reilly which really are books for dummies. I recently checked out O'Reilly's book on Objective C for Max OS X. It had almost nothing about Objective C. It was page after page of screen shots, and "explanations" telling you which menu button to click. They weren't teaching Objective C, they were teaching you how to navigate menus. There was a book for real dummies.
By default, XFree 86 let's you go from a console window back to the "GUI" with ctrl+alt+F7
Hate to break it to you, bub! It's a piece of jargon that's been documented at least since 1994.
And the muscular cyborg German dudes dance with sexy French Canadians
Yeah, windows has cryptic commands too, but how often are they used. In *nix's, solving a problem might require the use of a cryptic command where in windows, it's point and click here and there and it's fixed.
.conf files here and there. Those drake wizards mandrake users use, for example, take the cryptic command headache away from the user and makes changing settings like from the windows control panel.
The windows gui knows to an extent what's going on and has the ability to change settings and such. Linux on the other hand was designed not to require such levels of complication of the gui, but rather a bunch of
My point is that in linux, you WILL HAVE TO use commands more frequently than in windows to fix a problem. However, that may not be a bad thing as it doesn't require a configuration app to change settings. But for the beginner, this gets confusing. And man pages do not help at all when you're a beginner.
And btw, when kde crashes, I can't make any more sense out of the error messages than the ones that come from windows xp. Thank god for xkill though.
I could see "Unix for people who have no clue about Unix".
Me too, if they were paid by the word. But they're not. They were going for a shorty, catchy, memorable title; and the first book in the series was "DOS for Dummies", so it was a little alliteration as well.
NO CARRIER
These are some of my recent favs (in order of what I think is difficulty) :
Wicked Cool Shell Scripts
by Dave Taylor
Linux in a Nutshell 4TH Edition
by Ellen Siever
How Linux Works
by Brian Ward (Two thumbs up here)
Unix Shell Programming, Third Edition
by Stephen Kochan
Beginning Linux Prog 3RD Edition
by Neil Matthew
Advanced Programming in the Unix Environment
by W Richard Stevens (This isn't really too 'advanced'. I don't program, but this book gave me a great overview of the unix system and gives some sweet, usable examples that I think stand the test of time). Know a little c first, however.
I'll stop now.
_____ "If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." -- Orwell
Ctrl-Alt-Fn switches you to virtual console n. Each text console and each GUI is on a virtual console, and the GUI is generally on the first console which doesn't have anything else (like a login prompt) on it. In fact, you can generally start up multiple, completely independant, GUIs by logging into one of the text console and typing "startx -- :1", and it will be on the first console which is still unused (the one after your usual GUI, probably).
I'm not clear on where this is documented, but just trying other function keys with ctrl-alt should have worked. So the problem isn't actually the documentation, which was unnecessary, but that the nominally correct solution didn't work. I've found that you sometimes have to let go of ctrl and alt and press them again.
Try this project: Unix Utils
All the little unix commands and tools you love for that windows machine you despise.
What about _Introduction to Linux: A Hands on Guide_ by Machtelt Garrels? It doesn't have an insulting title and it's available for free from The Linux Documentation Project in different versions.
Perhaps a Linux newbie could ask for a printed copy and review for Slashdot.
Do what I do-give them a Knoppix disk or an ISOLinux boot disk and let them play with it for a month. Tell them to carefully research everything they can on the web, and maybe loog at a simple *nix manual. If they still want to install after that, set them up with something user-friendly (I sense a promising distro war would happen if I named distros, so I'll leave it to your own judgement;).
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
Heh, there are some other choice ones here:
. html
http://www.dummies.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-100157
I think my ex-landlord actually memorized the "Property Management for Dummies" edition.
Ummmm...IDG hasn't published dummies books for three years (they sold the book line). I'm not sure why you contacted them. This book is published by Wiley.
Lets see here I do it all the time without thinking. Oh right ctrl-alt-f1-6 for a terminal and then ctrl-alt-f7 for the GUI.
Good programmers drink beer to relieve job stress.
Great programmers drink hard liquor and work best hungover.