Most foot soldiers in the computer revolution belong to one of two camps, determined by the hardware and operating systems they use. Users who view the computer primarily as a business tool are attached to personal computers, and most of them use an Intel 80386 or 80486 processor and a Microsoft operating system (though a growing minority is fiercely loyal to the Macintosh). Technical users, and computer scientists in particular, favor RISC-based machines running some variety of the UNIX operating system. The UNIX advocates despise the technical weaknesses of the Intel/Microsoft environment, while application jockeys are intimidated by the expensive workstations, hacker culture, and terse documentation that characterize the UNIX world.
A step toward bridging the divide is the emergence of Linux, a full-function UNIX that runs on 80386 and 80486 platforms, outperforms many RISC workstation implementations, and is available free or at a nominal distribution cost as shareware. While Linux drastically reduces the cost of entering the UNIX world, it does not by itself address the cultural concerns. UNIX requires more systems administration than do traditional PC systems, its documentation is obtuse, and users tend to gain experience through a network of fellow users rather than from training classes or a vendor’s support staff. Strobel and Uhl lower this cultural hurdle by bringing together in a single, coherent volume the knowledge that a new user needs to acquire Linux, install it on a computer, and become acquainted with the wide range of applications that are either included with most Linux distributions or available (usually free) over the Internet. Both the book and the system originated in Europe: Linux in Finland (the name is a pun for the first name of its developer, Linus Torvalds), and the book as a translation from a work first published in German by authors who manage Linux PCs at German universities.
The book includes 12 chapters, an appendix, and a comprehensive index. Chapter 1, “Introduction,” provides a historical and cultural introduction to UNIX in general and Linux in particular.
Chapters 2, 3, and 4 provide the technical context for detailed installation and configuration instructions in later chapters. Chapter 2, “The Basics,” introduces UNIX concepts that will be new to a traditional PC user, such as multitasking, file systems, and daemons. Chapter 3, “Networking,” discusses the various network systems supported by Linux and the services they provide. Chapter 4, “Linux Features,” describes features of Linux that go beyond vanilla UNIX, including the concept of virtual consoles, emulators for DOS and Windows programs, data exchange utilities between DOS and UNIX, and a number of extensions in the tradition of the GNU project.
The next four chapters are a concise handbook for the novice system administrator. Chapter 5, “Installation,” walks the reader through the process of bringing up Linux on a new machine, starting with the question of where to get the Linux distribution. Chapter 6, “Configuration,” discusses the various alternatives that give UNIX such flexibility, and recommends options for general use. Chapter7, “Administration,” covers day-to-day operations such as booting the system, shutting it down, and managing multiple users. Chapter8, “Support and Help,” directs the reader to convenient entry points in the vast web of information resources on which experienced UNIX users draw.
The last four chapters describe particular applications that are available for Linux. Chapter 9, “X Window System,” reviews the features and structure of the X Window System and describes the XFree86 package that is distributed with Linux. Chapter 10, “Languages and Tools,” briefly describes a few of the many programming support tools that are available. Chapter 11, “Applications,” describes other available tools, including editors, graphic programs, word processing support, and games. (Business users will note that no spreadsheet programs are mentioned, although, using the pointers in this book, I was able to locate Oleo, a shareware spreadsheet for Linux, in about five minutes on the net.) Chapter12, “Network Applications,” offers a brief introduction to facilities such as email, Usenet news, Gopher, archie, and the World Wide Web (WWW), including pointers to several WWW home pages for Linux.
One confusing feature of UNIX is the labyrinth of directories across which critical system files are distributed. The appendix gives an overview of some of the more important files and subdirectories, presents a sample kernel configuration, and suggests 34 references for further reading.
It would be naive to expect that Linux will ever challenge commercially supported software for business application users. Commercially supported packages are adding much of the functionality of UNIX, often in the context of system-level support for object-oriented application components that goes well beyond UNIX. Furthermore, because Linux depends on details of the 80386/486 architecture, it will not appear on Macintoshes. Nevertheless, at the modest cost of another disk partition, Linux gives current members of the PC community access to the wide array of software that currently exists only under UNIX, and provides an economical alternative to workstations for many scientific users.
The book is attractively produced, with many screen dumps, page headings that show both chapter and section topics, and wide margins with keywords that call out several of the main subjects on each page. As a result, users can rapidly find the information they need. Many commercial software packages do not have documentation as clearly written or attractively formatted as this volume now provides for Linux.
