Customer Reviews

FreeBSD: An Open-Source Operating System for Your Personal Computer

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book finally gives provides an introduction and guide to FreeBSD for normal people.

Where Greg Leheys book is for IT-professionals and Ted Middlestaedts book focuses on FreeBSD in a corporate network, this book does a very good job at making FreeBSD available to the average computer literate person out there.

While not quite the "this is a keyboard" level of a "for dummies" book, this book never fails to explain things at a level which will be understandable for the normal people.

As a developer of FreeBSD since the very beginning, it is a great pleasure for me to see our code being made available to a larger audience, rather than just the rather select elite who have until now discovered and used FreeBSD.

Highly recommended!

Although there is a plethoria of Linux books, FreeBSD doesn't yet have too many. There is Mr. Lehey's extremely comprehensive
tome, which is excellent. However, there is also the need for a book like Ms. Anderson's. It takes itself a bit less seriously, but manages to give much necessary information and perfectly treads the fine line between being patronizing and leaving out things necessary to those who are as yet inexperienced with the operating system.

Since I began playing with BSD, I've thought there should be a book similar to Mr. Minasi's book on Linux for the NT Administrator--one that gives straightforward instructions on how to do things, but assumes that the reader has some intelligence. Ms Anderson's book fills that need quite well.

The only reason that I don't give it five stars is that I thought there was a bit too much on the installation--usually, an installation either goes moderately smoothly or doesn't go well and fails--she could have given a bit less detail about a smooth install and covered likely problems more completely, but this is possibly a personal quibble on my part. (I would have given 4-1/2 if I'd had the option--it's just a little short of perfect for what it is.) Ms. Anderson tries to address the less computer literate as well, so, perhaps the detail was necessary for her purposes. (Please don't think that the above means this is a "For Dummies" beginning with push that button on the front to turn on the computer--it most certainly isn't.

All in all, I would recommend this book to any of my friends beginning to investigate BSD--Ms. Anderson did a great job.

If you're a new user to FreeBSD, or have been thinking about trying it, "FreeBSD: An Open-Source Operating System for Your Personal Computer" is the one book you MUST squander your hard-earned money on.

This superbly written book is an excellent introduction to the FreeBSD operating system. It covers almost everything that a new user needs to know to get a FreeBSD system up and running: installing and configuring, setting up printers, setting up networking and getting connected to the Internet for mail and web browsing, adding additional software (such as shells) using ports and packages, compiling custom kernels, and administering the system with user management and recovering from crises. It even covers upgrading the entire installation to a newer version!

All this is done in a thoroughly professional manner. The book is written in non-technical, but literate, English and does not waste the reader's time by poorly written explanations that need be read and re-read while the reader attempts to puzzle out what the author REALLY meant -- the material is very clear throughout, and consists of discussions followed by easy to carry out steps explaining exactly what and how to do. And, most amazingly, these steps actually work as advertised: I was able to do all of the things that I mentioned in the first paragraph by following the instructions in the book.

Readers who finish this book will find that they can then handle the more advanced books on FreeBSD, such as the "FreeBSD Handbook", "The Complete FreeBSD," (neither of which I would recommend as beginning-level books) and "FreeBSD Unleashed." Their understanding will also allow full use of the wide variety of resources available on the web in areas which the book does not cover in detail, such as security and firewalls.

"FreeBSD: An Open-Source Operating System for Your Personal Computer" also includes a CD with FreeBSD 4.3 on it. This CD contains all that is needed to get started and has the software needed to work through the entire book.

In conclusion, I would simply say that this is the best beginner-level book on FreeBSD on the market. I'd give the book 5 stars.

This book is a must if you are learning BSD Unix. All the commands you'll ever use are covered in this book. This book is easy to read and explains important topics without being exhaustive (a skill some authors never learn). A great book for newbies to BSD Unix!

I think FreeBSD is the best OS on the market and this book is a must have if you are thinking of using FreeBSD or even if you just started using FreeBSD. It is written in a non-technical way that is easy to read and will quickly get you going and walk you through the first important steps of a very powerful operating system. It will help you better understand the next book that you should have for operating FreeBSD, Greg Lehey's "The Complete FreeBSD."

It steps you through the entire process of getting FreeBSD up and running the first time and explains why or why not to choose an option during the setup process. The author helps you with basic commands that you will use over and over again.

This book is as good as having someone there to walk you through your first steps of using FreeBSD. I applaud the author.

I first tried to install FreeBSD 4.8 on my K6-2 500mhz machine using the FreeBSD Handbook as a guide. While this book (the Handbook) is the standard for reference on the subject, it doesn't really explain it to a newbie's needs (even someone coming from Linux). My first attempts failed. I bought Annelise's book and was able to get 4.8 up and running following her suggestions. Though my copy came with a CD of FreeBSD 4.7, I had already burned ISO images of 4.8. The processes detailed in the book applied equally well. My only complaint would be that the book needs updating to reflect areas that a lot of people (most people) are interested in these days: burning music to CD - especially ATAPI CD devices, and USB mass storage devices. Both could be covered by a chapter on how to use SCSI emulation. I still give it 5 stars.

I opened this book and followed from page one until about page 60. Now I have a great BSD install that works perfectly. I refer to it when I have a question that google doesn't have an instant result for. I am a BSD newbie but I do have unix knowledge. I find this book absolutely perfect for the newest of new Unix users. The book is fairly priced and definitely has my two thumbs up. The writing was perfect for a layman like myself. The author explains the install process very clearly. Thank you Annelise.

"FreeBSD, 2nd Edition" is the best introductory UNIX book since Shah's "Linux Administration: A Beginner's Guide, 2nd Edition." So few authors remember that the people who read technical books need to solve real-world administration problems. Annelise Anderson knows the answers, and delivers the commands and concepts the FreeBSD beginner should understand. She offers practical guidance in a direct and simple manner. "FreeBSD, 2nd Edition" could be the book that convinces members of the Linux crowd to try another operating system.

Even though I've been administering FreeBSD servers for over a year, I still discovered many novel tips. "FreeBSD, 2nd Edition" covers material neglected in other recent FreeBSD books, such as apsfilter, the printing configuration tool. The author describes many of the small yet crucial details which make administration easier. These helpful recommendations include enabling color directory listings, clearing print queues, accessing extra terminals during installation, printing manual pages, and searching the ports tree using 'make search name=<target>'.

Beyond minor conveniences, the author shares numerous warnings against possible technical pitfalls, like trying to use cvsup on FreeBSD 4.3 RELEASE and earlier distros. She provides thorough documentation on many key aspects of FreeBSD administration, such as upgrades, enabling sound, and managing ports and packages.

The book differs from most UNIX books in that it does not spend a great deal of time discussing installation and configuration of common applications, like sendmail, BIND, Apache, and so on. While seasoned system administrators probably want more on these subjects, those new to the FreeBSD operating system need the foundation the author so skillfully builds.

If you're new to FreeBSD, you'll love this book. One word of caution: the binding seems weak, as mentioned in an earlier review. I've handled my copy carefully, and it remains intact. I hope it stays that way, since I plan to reference this book for months to come.

If you're looking for a place to start with FreeBSD (or with open soruce in general), this is really the book to get. I knew a little UNIX before I picked this up, but essentially I was a babe in the woods. This book helped me get my system up and running with clear, task-oriented discussions of all of the essentials. This doesn't go as deep as some of the other FreeBSD books out there (for that you'll probably want "Absolute BSD" by Michael Lucas), but it does tell you what you need to know to get started.

I bought the book after I had installed a broken FreeBSD 4.7 on my old AMD K6-II. Despite the few typos here and there, the book helped me figure out what mistakes I had made during my previous installation ! I thus re-installed from scratch, following page by page. In no time, the system was up and running, I was customizing my shell behavior, connecting to the internet through my cable modem (Roadrunner/Earthlink), etc...

With some extra hardware, my old AMD K6-II is now a router/firewall between my cable modem and my WinXP/Red Hat 8.0 dual-boot box without a glitch, and am planning to add a second box to my LAN and use it as a printer server too.

For those who still hesitate, this book is written in english, not in nerdish. That itself makes it stand out from all the computer litterature I've read. This book is very valuable.

Annelise: your book made my hardware firewall project feel like a walk in the park. Thank you so much !