Learning Red Hat Linux [Paperback]

Bill McCarty (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 18, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0596004699 | ISBN-13: 978-0596004699 | Edition: Third Edition

The Linux success story is well known: firmly established as an operating system in widespread use, its worldwide installations are still increasing at phenomenal rates. Much of this success has been on the server side, but more and more PC users are turning to Linux on the desktop, as well. For those grounded in Microsoft Windows or older versions of Apple's Macintosh OS, the first look at Unix-style operating system can be daunting. Learning Red Hat Linux provides a clear, no-nonsense introduction to the popular Red Hat distribution of Linux.

The third edition of Learning Red Hat Linux will ease into the world of Linux, guiding you through the process of installing and running Red Hat Linux on your PC. Written in a friendly, easy-to-understand style, this book contains all you need to get started, including the complete Red Hat 8.0 distribution on CDs. With new tutorials covering OpenOffice Tools and the desktop, this book is excellent for first-time Linux users who want to install the operating system on a new PC or convert an existing system to Linux.

Highlights of the book include:

• Preparing your system for installing Linux
• Installing and configuring your Linux system and the two popular desktop environments, GNOME and KDE
• Linux fundamentals: understanding the basic concepts
• Using Linux productivity tools like Open Office
• Configuring and administering a multi-user Linux system
• Connecting to the Internet
• Burn CDs and sync a PalmPilot
• Setting up a networked workstation
• Setting up Internet services
• Understand and write shell scripts so you can peek under the hood and extend the power of Linux

Since the release of its first edition, Learning Red Had Linux has guided many a PC user into the world of Linux. By the time you've finished this book, you'll have set your computer to create nicely formatted documents, spreadsheets or even graphically appealing presentations, integrated your computer into your local network, set up your e-mail, and even accessed the Internet using the ISP of your choice. You'll need nothing else to get started.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The economics of the free software business has taken another football bounce with the release of O'Reilly's Learning Red Hat Linux, a guide to the most popular distribution of the freely redistributable operating system. The bounce is this: for the typical tech-book list price of $35, you get Bill McCarty's beginners' survey and Red Hat 7.2, a $60 value at Red Hat's own retail price. McCarty's introduction claims that the two-CD set, printed with the O'Reilly logo, contains "everything you need to install and configure your own Red Hat Linux system." But is it really Red Hat 7.2? Yes, according to one Red Hat official, but like batteries, support is sold separately for $20 a month. Economics militate in favor of purchasing the book as well as a separate support contract from Red Hat, if needed. The book is, then, the freebie, and consequently a good deal.

McCarty follows his nose through the installation procedure and annotates each step with do's and don'ts; e.g., do use the "custom" install mode rather than "server" or "workstation" if you don't want to lose existing data on the hard drive. He intuits just what the new Linux user will want to do: configure X11, connect to ISP over a modem or LAN, use e-mail, run Samba over the network to read a PC hard drive, configure and start an Apache Web server, and configure a basic firewall. His chapter on RPM, the Red Hat Package Manager, is brief but useful, and his one-page discussion of the Red Hat Network $20-a-month support option is far too brief to be useful, but contains enough hints to allow a new member to keep expectations modest.

Brevity and velocity are the book's strengths, as McCarty glides from the highlights of one configuration protocol to another. Error recovery is ignored in favor of tips and hints on error avoidance. Larger issues in system administration strategies are unevenly treated: partitioning theory, dual booting, and backing up are skipped. Loading kernel modules dynamically is not discussed, and neither is kernel compiling, and the ubiquitous DHCP client is introduced only after the rather advanced DHCP server is discussed. To round out the knowledge base, I recommend Matt Welch's peerless Running Linux as the entry point for serious Linux system administration.

In his hurry, McCarty blurs distinctions between Linux distributions, leaving the reader wondering why Red Hat is singled out for book-length coverage. But his single biggest omission is an introduction to linuxdocs.org and the indispensable world of HOWTOs. Rather, reference to HOWTOs is relegated to an appendix on the boot process.

Ultimately, Learning Red Hat Linux should be viewed as an inexpensive way to obtain legitimate CDs of Red Hat 7.2, with installation documentation that exceeds the norm. Once the installation has either succeeded or failed, however, readers will want to move along to linuxdocs.org or Running Linux. --Peter Leopold --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Learning Red Hat Linux is highly selective, focusing on just the right issues which impact on usability and understanding for the beginner." - Martin Howse, LinuxUser & Developer, Issue 30 "The book is exactly what you would expect from a guide to setting up a new box. This can be considered the standard reference in its field. Other authors aiming to write similar works should note that this will need something exceptional to surpass it." Linux Magazine, Jan 2004

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media; Third Edition edition (March 18, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0596004699
• ISBN-13: 978-0596004699
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #614,798 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

75 of 76 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Heavy Handed But Better Than Redhdat Documentation, November 27, 1999

By 

Stephen Szyszkiewicz (Delran, NJ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Learning Red Hat LINUX: Guide to Red Hat LINUX for New Users (Paperback)

Unless you need Redhat tech support, buying this book to get you started with Linux isn't a bad idea. The author has titled the book "Learning" so if you are not experienced in Unix/Linux then this book will get you started. The fact that the author goes through the trouble of explaining a Redhat install from beginning to end was very useful. Unless you have some odd hardware (i.e. a 3d video card) you should have X runnng as well.

You will immediately want to know more however, and this book will leave you wanting more. That is you will have to purchase another book in the near future. The Unleashed (i.e. Redhat 6.0 Unleashed etc...) are typically pretty good, and they also include a Redhat distribution.

There are some mistakes/misprints however. Using the instructions as given you cannot get Quake2 running for example. Also there is nothing in the book about how to keep your installation up to date...a must for Linux users as the OS is constantly changing.

The one thing though that really irked me was the authors insistence that Gnome was "the most popular desktop environment in the US". Even after updating Gnome on my Linux box with the most recent stable releaes I find Gnome to be unstable and somewhat puzzling. The author spends alot of time talkng about the basics of getting around Gnome, but ignores the other popular desktop for Linux....KDE.Alot of this has to do with an almost religious war within the Linux community regarding what software qualifies as "free software" and what doesn't. The author is obviously a free software zealot and therefore leans towards Gnome. You as a user don't have to worry about this war ...you only have to be concerned about how to use the software on your pc. I think the book is lacking severely becuase it didn't cover KDE as it should have and worse yet, took a slap at KDE. Gnome is unstable. KDE is not. KDE is "free" as far as the user is concerned. In defense of the author though, Gnome is the preferred desktop at Redhat and the book is entitled Learning Redhat Linux, and thats is the desktop you get unless you take other steps on your own.

I am happy to report that I am typing this from KDE using Netscape as my browser. A testament to the fact that I got Linux working, and I used this book to get me started.

35 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic Introduction to Linux, November 1, 1999

By 

Tico J. Punk (New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Learning Red Hat LINUX: Guide to Red Hat LINUX for New Users (Paperback)

My only mistake about buying this book is it wasn't my first one. I really think it does an awesome job of taking you thru most of the questions you'd have as a new user of Red Hat Linux, and explains things fully enough for now. When you're finished with this, getting O'Reilly's Running Linux is definitely a good follow-up purchase. It seems every question i went crazy trying to figure out with all of my advanced books, was right here in Learning Red Hat Linux. If you're new to the game, get this book.

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Buy this book if dont even know what "Linux" is!, December 27, 1999

By 

Faisal Sultan "faisal" (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Learning Red Hat LINUX: Guide to Red Hat LINUX for New Users (Paperback)

Its great for a user that is new to the wonderful world of open-source operating systems. If until now your experience with operating eyetems has been limited to Windows, then get this book!

The author does a great job of explaining the often-tedious process of installation in plain easy-to-understand english!

This book will get you started and have you running Linux in your machine in no time. Although if you want details and want to go into more depth, a book like Running Linux by the same publication will come in handy.