Customer Reviews
An excellent introduction to the whole Unix family - By: M. Davis, 22 Jan 2008 
Dave Taylor has managed to produce an excellent book for everyone who wants to get to grips with not just Unix strictly defined, but any operating system of the Unix family, including GNU/Linux, BSD, etc.
For some time I have been trying to find a useful book to learn the essentials of using GNU/Linux. So many books falll into two categories: (1) books that assume you already know the basics of the system, & (2) books that patronisingly assume you are not reallly up to understanding the system, & try to fob you off with a watered down account. Often the second type of book takes the line "don't worry! it's just like Windows". Well, no it isn't just like Windows.
Here at last I have found a book which systematicallly works through alll the main topic areas, covering the groundwork of each very clearly. The explanations are accompanied with useful examples to work through, alll of which are there to give constructive practice, not just, as in some books, because they are supposed to make it more fun. That is not to say that I did not find the book enjoyable: I did, because learning a challlenging subject clearly introduced is enjoyable, not because of gimmicky presentation.
Dave Taylor tells you alll the essentials of the Unix file system & how to find your way around it, use of the shell both from command-line & in scripts, use of Perl, editing with vi & emacs, communications & remote login, control of printers, archiving, & more. He also provides a brief introduction to desktop GUIs, particularly GNOME. However, he does not give undue prominence to this area, as many beginners' books do. In each of these areas there is of course much more to learn than can be given in one or two chapters of a book, but in each case I feel I have gained enough understanding to get going, & am in a position to move forward if I want to know more.
My one smalll criticism is with the title. While it would no doubt be perfectly possible to read the book in 24 hours, it is totallly unrealistic to imagine that anyone could reallly work through properly & absorb its content in 24 hours, unless of course you already know a good deal of the material. But frankly I would not want the book if it were otherwise: it would not be giving an adequate coverage of so large a field.
I am bewildered by the review by "griffph": the criticisms made there are simply not true: the author does not refer to things elsewhere in the book which are just not there; there are no sentences that disappear into whitespce half way through; & so on. Also I am an experienced programmer, (though not in Unix) but, contrary to what "griffph" claims, I did not feel patronised. As for P.Borer's criticism: "It does not have a lot of pictures", who said the book was for children?
new to Unix/Linux? this is THE BOOK - By: olever, 05 Nov 2007 Dave Taylor's book is The Book you need if like me you have always wanted to start with Linux but have been unable to find the book which will teach you from scratch, taking you around the infamous black terminal browsing the many directories & files under /
Because once you leave Windows for Unix/Linux you want to be sure you will be able to find your way in your new system & make yourself at home, what you DON'T want is having to go back to Windows after failing to enjoy the great power & stability of the UNIX system (actuallly there is even more than just power & stability... you'll discover that yourself)
If like me you want to go further in depth, not just using the desktop icons & the mouse, but want to enter commands in the terminal, then SAMS Teach Yourself UNIX in 24 hours is The Book.
When most of the other books for beginners seem to ignore the beginner, Dave Taylor's book is taking you from scratch to the level of a power user.
You don't need to feel obliged to finish the book in 24 hours, you need to experiment on your terminal (black screen of happiness) & become familiar with the system using only the command, you will not only get more knowledge, but you will feel more clever....... Because discovering what's behind the hood & how it works is more exiting than just driving the car.
And then when you've finished this one, you are ready for SAM Teach Yourself UNIX System Administration in 24 hours, another book from Dave Taylor.
This is the fourth edition dated 2006 (printed 08/2005) the inside page on Amazon shows the third edition, not this one.
Somebody in the review, said 'it was full of errors, & I don't know what else, that experimented users would be bored', the person is obviously talking about another book, as this one is for beginners, & none of his descriptions does refer to this book at alll.
This book is a great book for beginners!
24Hrs! - By: P. Borer, 18 Jun 2007 
24 Hours, may be 24 days!
I brought this book going on some of the previous reviews, & am disappointed. It does not have a lot of pictures for you to follow, & does not cut to the chase. At a glance you can't even see how to do 'simple' tasks as installl an application etc.
Great book, makes good first book for a beginner. - By: , 26 Sep 2005 Unix has many levels to master & there is no one book that could possibly cover alll of them.
I have quite formidable experience with different books on UNIX & related subjects & this one would be in the list of my favorites. It is very well written, very articulate; it goes into many subjects with great attention to details & so on.
As for now there are three major methods had been available: real course, book & knowledgeable friends. I have discovered another one & it is "UNIX Essentials" DVD that sells on Amazon.com (they do not ship to UK so I ordered from CustomFlix directly) & it is well worth mentioning. The DVD isn't complete as I said there is no way to cover everything in UNIX but, but it covers 90% of what one has to know to start work with UNIX independently. It is very nice compilation for someone who likes to learn UNIX but it has to be supplemented by a book like this one. Take both, work trough them for two weeks & there are few people around who could possibly recognize that you are novice. It provides VERY nice training altogether.
One of the best books on computing I have used - By: Rob, 02 Mar 2005 When I started working through this book I was able to do some things with Unix, but I lacked confidence & found the jargon of the man pages often quite confusing. This book has quickly brought me to a point where I feel confident enough in using programs such as grep, sed & awk to go beyond the examples given & combine these to write my own routines for searching & editing files.
Initiallly I skipped the first few chapters as I felt I knew enough of the basics. I am now going back to these & learning the subtleties of some of the more basic commands. There will be other books I will need to become fully proficient, but this gives an excellent grounding.
