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The Official Ubuntu Book

Posted by samzenpus on from the read-all-about-it dept.

Craig Maloney writes "Over the long history of Linux, there have been many different distributions. One of the most famous distributions, love it or hate it, is the Ubuntu distribution. Ubuntu has come quickly from being the new kid on the block with the Warty Warthog release (4.10) to the most recent release Gutsy Gibbon (7.10). In that three year span, Ubuntu has grown from a handful of enthusiasts and developers to a thriving worldwide community. The Official Ubuntu Book is the official book from Canonical, which describes not only the Ubuntu distributions, but also the community from which Ubuntu is derived." Read below for the rest of Craig's review. The Official Ubuntu Book author Benjamin Mako Hill, Jono Bacon, et. al pages 463 publisher Prentice Hall rating 9 reviewer Craig Maloney ISBN 0-13-235413-6 summary An excellent way to get introduced to the Ubuntu distribution and community The Official Ubuntu Book is comprised of 10 main chapters covering various aspects of the Ubuntu project. The first chapter discusses a bit of the history of the Ubuntu project, as well as the relationship of Canonical to the project. Chapter 2 dives into installing Ubuntu from either the Live CD or the Alternative installation CD. Chapter 3 shows how to use the applications that ship with Ubuntu with some detail. Some of the more in-depth programs get more attention, like The GIMP and Firefox. Also covered are the basics of the GNOME interface, such as adding items to the panels, or logging off of the system. Chapter 4 covers basic system administration (printers, upgrades, file sharing), and package management. Chapter 5 introduces the Ubuntu Server variant, covering RAID, LVM, and more package management techniques. Chapter 6 deals with support issues in a question / answer format, and is a great place for readers to get some of their more common questions answered. Chapter 7 covers the Kubuntu variant of Ubuntu in more depth. Chapter 8 and 9 introduce the Ubuntu Community, and the tools that keep the Ubuntu project running. These chapters alone should be required reading for anyone with more than a passing interest in the Ubuntu project. Lastly, Chapter 10 covers the Edbuntu project, and demonstrates how to set up a LTSP network. The appendices include the Ubuntu related documents, a quick tutorial on the command line, and a great Windows / Ubuntu equivalent section for those who are looking for the best alternatives for certain Windows programs. All-in-all, The Official Ubuntu Book covers the main aspects of the Ubuntu project in a very thorough manner.

Included with the book is the Ubuntu 7.04 release (Feisty Fawn) on DVD. This is a solid release, and was current at the time the book was published. It still has 12 months active support even in light of the recent 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) release, and should give those looking to try Ubuntu an excellent starting point.

The biggest issue facing a book like The Official Ubuntu Book is determining a target audience. Ubuntu appeals to a wide range of people; from the newest newbie to the hardened UNIX aficionado. Making a book that speaks to both is no easy task. Fortunately, The Book does an admirable job of providing enough to keep both parties interested. New Ubuntu users will find lots of information about how to get things accomplished in Ubuntu, while seasoned UNIX user will find enough information to see what th differences are between Ubuntu and other Linux distributions. Both will find a great introduction to participating with the rest of the Ubuntu community in the later chapters of the book. Any user of Ubuntu would be well served in reviewing those chapters fora sense of what opportunities exist, and how best to participate in the community given their talents and skills. True, the chapters describing specific applications lack much depth, but the omission can be forgiven in light of the shear amount of material covered. Just learning how to navigate what is provided on the live CD could fill a tome the size of this book, leaving no room to discuss the more about the community. The Official Ubuntu Book balances between both extremes, and provides plenty of information about both the Ubuntu distribution, and the community.

The success of the Ubuntu project is due in no small part to the people who spend their time participating with other Ubuntu users. Reading the book not only gives a sense of what Ubuntu is about, but also shows how open and inviting these users are. It may not be the best tutorial for the new Linux user, but it is an excellent book for those who want to take the next step and be a part of putting together and supporting a large Linux distribution. The Official Ubuntu Book captures the spirit of the Ubuntu community well, and brings the excitement in a palpable form to the reader. I can recommend this book to new users of Ubuntu with only the caution that they may need to find other resources to learn the many new programs that ship with Ubuntu. However, I can also highly recommend this book to anyone who has even a passing interest in getting involved with the Ubuntu project, both new and experienced. The Official Ubuntu Book, much like the Ubuntu project, is an ambitious undertaking, and similarly we all benefit from their hard work.

You can purchase The Official Ubuntu Book from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

31 of 139 comments (clear)

  1. The probem with these types of books is that... by AltGrendel · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...these things are usually obsolete in, oh say, 6 months or so.

    --
    The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination

    - Douglas Adams

    1. Re:The probem with these types of books is that... by farkus888 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      it seems they are outdated by the time they hit the shelfs unless you are running the LTS version of the operating system. The massive resources on the internet are probably more useful and thorough than this book. but my real point is that I feel bad for anyone who buys the book, realizes you can't log in as root, and decides to never use ubuntu again.

      --
      thats right, I rarely use capitals. deal with it. but don't mistake my laziness for stupidity
    2. Re:The probem with these types of books is that... by bcrowell · · Score: 5, Informative

      Some things change more rapidly than others. I have a student who's trying to get started with Linux on an old machine his family had around. He's asking me questions like, "Where can you learn how to do that command line stuff?" and "What's a window manager?" The answers to those questions aren't going to change in six months.

      From my point of view as a relatively experienced Linux user, the usefulness of such a book is probably a lot less. I have a big, long set of notes on Unix that I maintain in a personal wiki, and I doubt that there's very much in the intersection of {things I need to know} & {things I don't have in my notes} & {things that are in this book}. The main thing that's kicking my butt with ubuntu these days is cups and network printing; every time I manage to get it working, it takes a couple of weekends of pulling my hair out, and then it breaks again at the next upgrade. For that, the book is certain to be useless to me because of obsolescence, and also probably because the issue with cups seems to have more to do with poor design and integration into the distro. Another big problem a lot of people are suffering from is difficulties wifi and laptop power management. (Personally, wifi Just Works for me these days, and power management Just Doesn't Work). The book won't help with those issues, because they're fundamentally related to the proprietary nature of the hardware (e.g., hardware manaufacturers not publicly documenting the registers that need to be saved when you put your machine to sleep).

      There are also certain categories of specialized, advanced knowledge that won't change anytime soon, but that most people don't need to know. For instance, I have a copy of "The Debian System" by Krafft, and although I can't recommend the book in general, it does have a reasonably intelligible and detailed discussion of the debian packaging system, which for me has turned out to be a lot more helpful than the various online descriptions (which are poorly written, disorganized, incomplete, and never up to date).

      One of the big advantages of FreeBSD over Linux, IMO, is that FreeBSD is a single complete operating system, not a kernel that's packaged in a whole bunch of different distros, so you can buy a book on FreeBSD, and it will document the actual system you're using.

      --
      Find free books.
    3. Re:The probem with these types of books is that... by rk · · Score: 2, Insightful

      "The main thing that's kicking my butt with ubuntu these days is cups and network printing; every time I manage to get it working, it takes a couple of weekends of pulling my hair out, and then it breaks again at the next upgrade. For that, the book is certain to be useless to me because of obsolescence, and also probably because the issue with cups seems to have more to do with poor design and integration into the distro."

      I think you're closer to the truth regarding distro integration, because my experience with CUPS in Slackware 12.0 was the exact opposite. I went into it dreading it too, because I am famous for not getting along with printers at all. I started at 11 am on Saturday, figuring the bulk of my weekend would need to be sacrificed just so I could print from my new system. All I did was start the CUPS server, logged on to it, told it the printer's IP and model number, and it Just Worked(tm). I was done and printing recipes for Ethiopian dishes at 11:02am :-). I was simultaneously pleased and flabbergasted all at once.

      It's somewhat surprising to me a distro targeted in part at the newbie market would be such a bear to configure to do as common a task as using a printer, especially when it's using the same software package a "hard" distro like Slackware uses.

    4. Re:The probem with these types of books is that... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      "but my real point is that I feel bad for anyone who buys the book, realizes you can't log in as root, and decides to never use ubuntu again."

      Yes, going into the User Accounts section and enabling the root account takes hours.

    5. Re:The probem with these types of books is that... by ctr2sprt · · Score: 2, Interesting

      All I did was start the CUPS server, logged on to it, told it the printer's IP and model number, and it Just Worked(tm).

      I think you and the GP are talking about different classes of printer, here, based on the fact that yours has an IP address. It's the cheapie inkjets that you get for free with a $500 computer that don't work right in Linux.

      Pretty much any laser printer is going to Just Work(tm) in Linux, especially if you're sending it PCL or PS to its built-in, lpd-compatible print server over a TCP/IP network. Which is the way businesses usually do it, and that's why they work so well in Unix. (I bet you could plug a modern-day HP 4050 into a network of VAXen and they'd be able to print to it with no special configuration, too.)

    6. Re:The probem with these types of books is that... by bcrowell · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I think you and the GP are talking about different classes of printer, [...] It's the cheapie inkjets that you get for free with a $500 computer that don't work right in Linux.

      Just to clarify, I'm the GP poster, and I have a laser printer, not an inkjet. What's kicking my butt time after time is network printing, not printing locally. I think part of the problem may be that the cups developers and the Ubuntu developers are on different wavelengths about security. I keep seeing cases where the default in cups is supposed to be easy, but ubuntu has disabled the easy functionality for security reasons. IIRC, they disabled the entire web browser interface for a while, and the problem I'm currently having is that between Fiesty and Gutsy there's been a regression in network printing functionality, which seems to be security related. IMO there ought to be a button in the cups browser interface that you can click that says "Goddamn it, I'm on a home network behind a router, and the router has a built-in firewall. Stop breaking all my functionality in the name of security, and let my wife and kids print on this printer!"

      --
      Find free books.
  2. Idea for a promo by Huntr · · Score: 5, Funny

    Buy the book, get a free hard drive.

    Kidding!

  3. That's Why I Hate Magazines. by CheeseburgerBrown · · Score: 5, Funny

    My issues of Newsweek from 1993 are practically useless now.

    --
    These stories are free but worth money.
    1. Re:That's Why I Hate Magazines. by east+coast · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Just wait a couple years, it will be the same stories only most of the names will have changed.

      --
      Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
    2. Re:That's Why I Hate Magazines. by lavid · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You should have kept the ones from the mid to late eighties, it's the same stories with the same names!

      --
      If Bush wants to kill the terrorists, he should jump off a cliff.
    3. Re:That's Why I Hate Magazines. by frankmu · · Score: 4, Funny

      oh, i don't know. there are some classic "articles" and "short stories" from old Playboy magazines.

      --
      Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
    4. Re:That's Why I Hate Magazines. by Mahjub+Sa'aden · · Score: 2, Funny

      The deeply insightful articles over the years about the Rise and Fall of Bush? An era that's come to an end, my friend. Once the was much Bush, now you can glance through the magazine without encountering any.

      Oh how the might have fallen. Er... shaved.

      --
      What is is all that is. Isn't that obvious?
  4. Re:I love Ubuntu. by AmaDaden · · Score: 5, Informative

    Something new to 7.10 or gusty gibbon is a xorg configuration utility that should be able to help you out.

  5. Finally - an antisocial way to approach Ubuntu! by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 4, Funny

    The success of the Ubuntu project is due in no small part to the people who spend their time participating with other Ubuntu users. Reading the book not only gives a sense of what Ubuntu is about, but also shows how open and inviting these users are.


    Finally - this book provides an antisocial way to approach Ubuntu.
  6. Re:Supposed to be easy to use... by famicommie · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Remember that Mac that was released that didn't even have a manual? That's what the goal should be. I agree whole heartedly. Ubuntu is "GNU/Linux for Human Beings", something I personally translate to mean "accessible to everyone regardless of experience or expertise". At my recommendation, two of my friends have installed Ubuntu and have since begun using it as their primary OS. It's been about nine months so far, and between the two of them I get at most one support call a month. What I don't like about your statement is that it infers that the existence of an official Ubuntu book necessarily means Ubuntu is not accessible to everyone. That is a very silly jump of logic. Ubuntu is pretty easy for almost anyone to pick up and run. This book is for users who don't just want a whizbang Word Processing Internet Browsing Machine but want to learn about some of the underlying dynamics of the system and it's applicable uses. My grandmother is mostly uninterested in enabling filesharing, but I am sure that there are hobbyists out there who would like a reliable guide to set up a LTSP network and put the OS to more complicated uses than sharing pictures of cats with friends. The Mac, like Ubuntu, offers both ease of use and a powerful underlying system. Sure, your grandma might be content with performing simple tasks, but there IS a terminal available for the geeks out there. Simplicity and power are not mutually exclusive.
  7. Re:Supposed to be easy to use... by pak9rabid · · Score: 4, Funny

    So why does it need a book?

    So you have something to do in the restroom?

  8. Ubuntu Books by stoolpigeon · · Score: 2, Informative

    There are so many ubuntu books available - it's really quite an indication of how popular this distro has become. Though the same measuring stick would show that fedora has more material out there. It has been around longer though.
     
    I work with Red Hat in my job, so I stick with Fedora but I'm seeing more folks around here running Ubuntu on their desktops.

    --
    It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
  9. Re:Supposed to be easy to use... by mackyrae · · Score: 2, Informative

    There's the live install cd AND the alternate install cd. The alternate install cd uses the ncurses Debian-Installer and offers more advanced options for more advanced users.

    --
    look! it's a bird, it's a plane, it's....a girl? yes, a girl browsing Slashdot on Linux
  10. Re:Supposed to be easy to use... by pizzach · · Score: 2, Funny

    I don't know. I have always found paperback a bit too ruff for my tastes. Plus there is the problem with getting the pages out Once out, they never seem to flush down the toilet right either.

    --
    Once you start despising the jerks, you become one.
  11. Re:Supposed to be easy to use... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    For those who are tuning in late, UbuntuDupe had a problem installing Ubuntu. But what makes him unique is he still dwells on it more than two years later!

  12. Shouldst it not be ' Thou Fool' ? by tehdaemon · · Score: 5, Funny

    Wot ye not that human speech doest alter from year to year, and generation to generation? Wherefore then art thou distraught over 'comprised'? Pray then, do not let thine fondness of the past nor desire to linger therein prove a thorn in the side of thine fellow man, nor an hindrance to his future.

    T

    --
    Laws are horrible moral guides, moral guides make even worse laws.
  13. Full text of book by garbletext · · Score: 3, Funny

    The official Ubuntu Book, by Mark Shutleworth. Chapter One: RTFM! The End.

  14. I feel your pain by The+Monster · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I wouldn't object were it not for the fact that this new sense of "comprise" has a meaning in direct opposition to the older sense. That threatens to deprive the word of any meaning other than "Here's one thing, and a group of things that together make up the one thing, but I'm not going to tell you which is which; you can just try to figure it out by context!"

    That and I'm of the opinion that people really don't understand the word, but it sounds more intelligent than "compose", so they try to sound smarter than they really are (and in the process end up sounding stupid).

    --

    [100% ISO 646 Compliant]
    SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.

  15. Re:I dislike Ubuntu by plasticsquirrel · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If your biggest complaint about Ubuntu is that it mounts CD's for you, then you should really be complaining about every GUI-oriented distribution in the last 10+ years. Slackware is great for learning Linux (6-7 years on my desktop), but Ubuntu is unique in that it gets out of the way of the user. No Slackware /etc files to edit, and no SuSE big clunky icons and huge taskbars to get in your way. And if you think that people wanting a simple, eloquent operating system should go with Windows, then you're pretty out of touch with reality.

    --
    Systemd: the PulseAudio of init systems
  16. Re:Good use of english by fbjon · · Score: 3, Funny

    Once upon a time, it took three years for a Debian release...

    --
    True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.
  17. Re:I love Ubuntu. by miro+f · · Score: 3, Interesting

    actually there's also a new "failsafe graphics mode" which is supposed to make sure you always get a gui no matter how much you bork your xorg.conf

    dunno how well it works though, I never really had any issues like that...

    --
    being vague is almost as cool as doing that other thing...
  18. community by rasputin465 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ...the community from which Ubuntu is derived.

    And by "community" you mean "debian".

  19. Kudos by AlXtreme · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Just wanted to say kudos to Mako for this book and his work for both Debian and Ubuntu. You're doing a fine job!

    --
    This sig is intentionally left blank
  20. Re:I love Ubuntu. by Bambi+Dee · · Score: 2, Informative

    The nvidia-settings tool wrote me a Twinview xorg.conf that wasn't even half the size of the one I'd been lugging around from distro to distro, and it worked; just had to add some single-screen metamodes for fullscreen games...

  21. Re:I dislike Ubuntu by rjames13 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I know it sound weird, but I just can't handle Ubuntu, It's so user-friendly it's lame! I mean, why would I want an auto-mount for my cd-rom?!
    If I wanted all that I would have used Windows at first place, I mean, If you're a user which came to Linux to look for alternative, Ubuntu is for you, but if you came to look for something better then Windows, the last thing on earth I would suggest is Ubuntu (I'd suggest Slackware, which is my favorite). That's why also I don't there's a need for Ubuntu handbook, I mean, it's all GUIish (jesus!).

    I hope I will not get -1 flamebait cause that's what I really thing (plus, my karma now is terrible, and I'm doing my best to fix it, don't make me sad :(, that's really my opinion.).
    Happy 10Th Slashdot birthday!

    You don't get it do you. There are two types of computer users, those who understand how it works and those who just want it to work. Now since we want FOSS to overtake the world we need either a Distro for both users or separate Distros for each. Ubuntu supplies that separate Distro. It is not a MS Windows clone either. Ubuntu is about making the computer easier to use. MS Windows is about making a profit which somehow matches making the computer easy to use. However MS Windows can only go so far, Ubuntu can go much further. If you actually used both Ubuntu and MS Windows you would realize that they are chalk and cheese. Don't associate MS Windows with easy to use because it is actually not, it just has the trappings of it.

    As far as I am concerned both Slackware and Ubuntu have a future, they are aimed at different users. Don't dismiss these Ubuntu newbies as the worst thing since the GUI. You have a lot to teach them, you have a purpose that is defined by the fact that you know how the system works. They have different purposes. Don't get confused by this new world order, or you will just end up bitter.

    P.S. I am writing this from a Slackware machine.

    P.P.S I notice that somehow you have been voted offtopic when you should have been modded flamebait. This just proves that most of the moderators are on crack.