Bash Guide for Beginners (Paperback)

by Machtelt Garrels (Author)
Key Phrases: writing interactive scripts, file name expansion, shell initialization files, Exercises These, Advantages of the Bourne Again, Debugging Bash (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
This guide discusses concepts useful in the daily life of the serious Bash user.

While a basic knowledge of shell usage is required, it starts with a discussion of shell building blocks and common practices.

Then it presents the grep, awk and sed tools that will later be used to create more interesting examples. The second half of the course is about shell constructs such as loops, conditional tests, functions and traps, and a number of ways to make interactive scripts.

All chapters come with examples and exercises that will help you become familiar with the theory.

About the Author
Linux advocate of the first hour, Machtelt Garrels has made many contributions to the Open Source community and has been working for over a decade on the wider acceptance of Linux and other Open Source products. She is an active member of the Linux Documentation Project and training manager at CoreSequence. She writes whenever she has the time, closing gaps in existing documentation and taking the opportunity to simplify it when necessary, always keeping in mind that practice is the only way to learn. As a result, her work is full of examples and exercises, forcing the reader to apply the theoretical concepts.

Product Details

• Paperback: 216 pages
• Publisher: Fultus Corporation (June 22, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0974433942
• ISBN-13: 978-0974433943
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,813,515 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars It is very well written high quality book!, July 5, 2007

By	Alex Vox (Winnetka, IL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bash Guide for Beginners (Paperback)

First of all let me say that the negative review left on this book is a pure blah. This book in different editions is a foundation of extensive knowledge for crowds of knowledgeable system administrators and advanced users. I was taking different books and DVD trainings on the subject and must say it is very good book for intelligent reader. I guess this review is part of the "book war" just to lower scores of competitors to increase someone else's sales (he published the same nonsense on another edition of the book).
There's no doubt it is technical book and should be treated and judged as such. I found the book is to be well organized, the examples are tested and working (that is rare) and I enjoyed it as much as another Machtelt's book on Linux.
What I especially like about this book it does not treat you like an idiot. You are addressed in professional terms, the terms are explained, all the tools becoming clear and it actually open the road for reading more advanced literature on the subject. There are plenty of books around there on the subject but few are written by real professional, by people who reached that level of professional vision that allows them to communicate the subject as knowledge, not just as workbook or bunch of examples.
This is excellent book for thinking and intelligent beginner who seeks the real beefy knowledge, not just beating around the bush. Highly recommended!

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not Fit for Publication--The Bash Guide for Beginners., January 29, 2006

By	L. C. Libotte (Perth. Western Australia) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I have several hundred technical books on my bookshelf acquired over many years of my career as a professional instrument and control engineer.I have never read a technical book so badly written as "Bash Guide for Beginners". The writing is unstructured and chaotic, and would confuse an experienced programmer let alone a beginner. It should be taken off the bookshelves. Not recommended--I am returning the book.