A Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux / Edition 7

by Mark Sobell

Overview

“I have found this book to be a very useful classroom text, as well as a great Linux resource. It teaches Linux using a ground-up approach that gives students the chance to progress with their skills and grow into the Linux world. I have often pointed to this book when asked to recommend a solid Linux reference.”
— Eric Hartwell, Chair, School of Information Technology, ITT Technical Institute

Master All the Techniques You Need to Succeed with Fedora™ or Red Hat® Enterprise Linux®

• The #1 Fedora and RHEL resource—a tutorial AND on-the-job reference
• Master Linux administration and security using the command line, GUI tools, Python, systemd, and firewalld
• Set up key Internet servers, step by step, including Samba, Apache, MariaDB/MySQL, sendmail, OpenSSH, DNS, LDAP, and more
• Brand-new chapter on Virtual Machines and Cloud Computing!

In this comprehensive guide, one of the world’s leading Linux experts brings together all the knowledge and real-world insights you need to master and succeed with today’s versions of Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Best-selling author Mark Sobell explains Linux clearly and effectively, focusing on skills you’ll actually need as a user, programmer, or administrator.

Sobell assumes no prior Linux knowledge. He starts at the beginning and walks you through every topic and task that matters, using easy-to-understand examples. Step by step, you’ll learn how to install and configure Linux from the accompanying DVD, navigate its graphical user interface, provide file/printer sharing, configure network servers, secure Linux desktops and networks, work with the command line, administer Linux efficiently, and automate administration using Python and bash.

Mark Sobell has taught hundreds of thousands of Linux and UNIX professionals. He knows every Linux nook and cranny—and he never forgets what it’s like to be new to Linux. Whatever you want to do with Linux—now or in the future—you’ll find it in this book.

Compared with other Linux books, A Practical Guide to Fedora™and Red Hat®Enterprise Linux ®, Seventh Edition, delivers

• Complete, up-to-the-minute coverage of Fedora 19 and RHEL 7 (beta)
• New programming chapters that cover Python and MariaDB/MySQL, plus a new tutorial on using GnuPG to encrypt communications
• Information on state-of-the-art security: SELinux, ACLs, firewalld ( firewall-config and firewall-cmd), iptables ( system-config-firewall), GnuPG, and OpenSSH
• New chapter on VMs (virtual machines) and cloud computing, including VMware, QEMU/KVM, virt-manager, virsh, GNOME Boxes, and AWS (Amazon Web Services)
• Expanded command-line coverage, including a new chapter that details 32 important utilities
• Practical information on Internet server configuration, including Apache, sendmail, NFSv4, DNS/BIND, the new LDAP Dynamic Server, and IPv6
• Complete “meat-and-potatoes” information on system/network administration, now including GRUB 2, the XFS filesystem, the new Anaconda Installer, the systemd init daemon, firewalld, and NetworkManager
• Detailed instructions on keeping Linux systems up to date, finding software packages, and working with repositories using yum and rpm
• Full coverage of the LPI Linux Essentials exam objectives plus extensive coverage of the CompTIA Linux+ exam objectives; Appendix E provides a map from objectives to pages in the book
• New coverage of find, sort, xz (compression), free, xargs, and the nano editor
• And much more, including a 500+ term glossary and comprehensive indexes

Includes DVD! Get the full version of the Fedora 19 release!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780133477436
Publisher:	Pearson Education
Publication date:	12/31/2013
Edition description:	7th ed.
Pages:	1408
Sales rank:	1,117,560
Product dimensions:	9.10(w) x 11.20(h) x 2.40(d)

About the Author

Mark G. Sobell is President of Sobell Associates Inc., a consulting firm that specializes in UNIX and Linux training, support, and documentation. He has more than thirty years of experience working with UNIX and Linux systems and is the author of many best-selling books, including A Practical Guide to Linux® Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming, Third Edition, and A Practical Guide to Ubuntu Linux®, Third Edition, both from Prentice Hall.

Read an Excerpt

The Book

Whether you are an end user, a system administrator, or a little of each, this book explains with step-by-step examples how to get the most out of a Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) system. In 28 chapters, this book takes you from installing a Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux system through understanding its inner workings to setting up secure servers that run on the system.The Audience

This book is designed for a wide range of readers. It does not require you to have programming experience, but having some experience using a general-purpose computer is helpful. This book is appropriate for

• Students who are taking a class in which they use Linux
• Home users who want to set up and/or run Linux
• Professionals who use Linux at work
• System administrators who need an understanding of Linux and the tools that are available to them
• Computer science students who are studying the Linux operating system
• Programmers who need to understand the Linux programming environment
• Technical executives who want to get a grounding in Linux

Benefits

A Practical Guide to Fedora^™ and Red Hat^® Enterprise Linux^®, College Edition, gives you a broad understanding of many facets of Linux, from installing Fedora/RHEL through using and customizing it. No matter what your background, this book gives you the knowledge you need to get on with your work. You will come away from this book understanding how to use Linux, and this book will remain a valuable reference for years tocome.Overlap

If you read A Practical Guide to Linux^® Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming, you will notice some overlap between that book and the one you are reading now. The first chapter, and the chapters on the utilities, the filesystem, programming tools, and the appendix on regular expressions are very similar in the two books, as are the three chapters on the Bourne Again Shell (

bash). Chapters that appear in this book but not in A Practical Guide to Linux^® Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming include Chapters 2 and 3 (installation), Chapters 4 and 8 (Fedora/RHEL and the GUI), Chapter 10 (networking), all of the chapters in Part IV (system administration) and Part V (servers), and Appendix C (security).This Book Includes Fedora 8 on a DVD

A Practical Guide to Fedora^™ and Red Hat^® Enterprise Linux^®, College Edition, includes a DVD that you can use to install or upgrade to Fedora 8. Chapter 2 helps you get ready to install Fedora. Chapter 3 provides step-by-step instructions for installing Fedora from this DVD. This book guides you through learning about, using, and administrating Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux.What Is New in This Edition?

The college edition of A Practical Guide to Fedora^™ and Red Hat^® Enterprise Linux^® covers Fedora 8 and Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 5. There is a new section on LDAP in Chapter 21. Chapters 2 and 3 cover booting into a live session and installing from live media. All the changes, large and small, that have been made to Fedora/RHEL since the previous edition of this book have been incorporated into the explanations and examples.Features of This Book

This book is designed and organized so you can get the most out of it in the shortest amount of time. You do not have to read this book straight through in page order. Once you are comfortable using Linux, you can use this book as a reference: Look up a topic of interest in the table of contents or index and read about it. Or think of the book as a catalog of Linux topics: Flip through the pages until a topic catches your eye. The book includes many pointers to Web sites where you can get additional information: Consider the Internet an extension of this book.

A Practical Guide to Fedora^™ and Red Hat^® Enterprise Linux^®, College Edition, is structured with the following features:

• In this book, the term Fedora/RHEL refers to both Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Features that apply to only one operating system or the other are marked as such using these indicators:

  FEDORA or

  RHEL.

• Optional sections enable you to read the book at different levels, returning to more difficult material when you are ready to delve into it.
• Caution boxes highlight procedures that can easily go wrong, giving you guidance before you run into trouble.
• Tip boxes highlight ways that you can save time by doing something differently or situations when it may be useful or just interesting to have additional information.
• Security boxes point out places where you can make a system more secure. The security appendix presents a quick background in system security issues.
• Concepts are illustrated by practical examples throughout the book.
• Chapter summaries review the important points covered in each chapter.
• Review exercises are included at the end of each chapter for readers who want to further hone their skills. Answers to even-numbered exercises are at www.sobell.com.
• This book provides resources for finding software on the Internet. It also explains how download and install software using

  yum, BitTorrent, and, for Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Network (RHN).

• The glossary defines more than 500 common terms.
• The book describes in detail many important GNU tools, including the

  gcc C compiler, the

  gdb debugger, the GNU Configure and Build System,

  make, and

  gzip.

• Pointers throughout the text provide help in obtaining online documentation from many sources including the local system, the Red Hat Web site, the Fedora Project Web site, and other locations on the Internet.
• Many useful URLs (Internet addresses) point to sites where you can obtain software, security programs and information, and more.
• The comprehensive index helps you locate topics quickly and easily.

Key Topics Covered in This Book

This book contains a lot of information. This section distills and summarizes its contents. You may want to review the table of contents for more detail. This book covers the following.Installation

• Describes how to download from the Internet and burn both Fedora Desktop Live Media CD/DVDs and Fedora Install Media DVDs.
• Helps you plan the layout of the system’s hard disk and assists you in using Disk Druid or the GNOME graphical partition editor (

  gparted) to partition the hard disk.

• Explains how to use the Logical Volume Manager (LVM2) to set up, grow, and migrate logical volumes, which are similar in function to traditional disk partitions.
• Discusses booting into a live Fedora session and installing Fedora from that session.
• Describes in detail how to install Fedora/RHEL from a DVD, CD, a hard disk, or over a network using FTP, NFS, or HTTP.
• Covers boot command line parameters (

  FEDORA), responses to the boot: prompt (

  RHEL), and explains how to work with Anaconda, Fedora/RHEL’s installation program.

• Covers the details of customizing the X.org version of the X Window System.

Working with Fedora/RHEL

• Introduces the graphical desktop (GUI) and explains how to use desktop tools including the panel, Panel menu, Main menu, Window Operations menu, Desktop menu, Desktop switcher, and terminal emulator.
• Presents the KDE desktop and covers using Konqueror to manage files, start programs, and browse the Web.
• Covers the GNOME desktop and the Nautilus file manager.
• Explains how to customize your desktop to please your senses and help you work more efficiently.
• Covers the Bourne Again Shell (

  bash) in three chapters, including an entire chapter on shell programming that includes many sample shell scripts.

• Explains the command line interface (CLI) and introduces more than 30 command line utilities.
• Presents a tutorial on the

  vim (

  vi work-alike) textual editor.

• Covers types of networks, network protocols, and network utilities.
• Explains hostnames, IP addresses, and subnets, and explores how to use

  host and

  dig to look up domain names and IP addresses on the Internet.

• Covers distributed computing and the client/server model.

System Administration

• Explains how to use the Fedora/RHEL

  system-config-* tools to configure the display, DNS, Apache, a network interface, and more. You can also use these tools to add users and manage local and remote printers. (See page 429 for a list of these tools.)

• Describes how to use the following tools to download software and keep a system current:

• yum—Downloads and installs software packages from the Internet, keeping a system up-to-date and resolving dependencies as it processes the packages. You can run

  yum manually or set it up to run automatically every night.

• BitTorrent—Good for distributing large amounts of data such as the Fedora installation DVD and the live media CD/DVD. The more people who use BitTorrent to download a file, the faster it works.

• up2date—The Red Hat Enterprise Linux tool for keeping system software current.

• Covers graphical system administration tools, including the Main menu, GNOME and KDE menu systems, KDE Control Center, and KDE Control panel.
• Explains system operation, including the boot process, init scripts, emergency mode, rescue mode, single-user and multiuser modes, and steps to take if the system crashes.
• Describes files, directories, and filesystems, including types of files and filesystems,

  fstab (the filesystem table), automatically mounted filesystems, filesystem integrity checks, filesystem utilities, and fine-tuning of filesystems.

• Covers backup utilities including

  tar,

  cpio,

  dump, and

  restore.

• Explains how to customize and build a Linux kernel.

Security

• Helps you manage basic system security issues using

  ssh (secure shell), vsftpd (secure FTP server), Apache (the httpd Web server),

  iptables (firewall), and more.

• Presents a complete section on SELinux (Security Enhanced Linux), including instructions for using

  system-config-selinux to configure SELinux.

• Covers using

  system-config-firewall to set up a basic firewall to protect the system.

• Provides instructions on using

  iptables to share an Internet connection over a LAN and to build advanced firewalls.

• Describes how to set up a

  chroot jail to protect a server system.

• Explains how to use TCP wrappers to control who can access a server.
• Covers controlling servers using the xinetd superserver.

Clients and Servers

• Explains how to set up and use the most popular Linux servers, providing a chapter on each: Apache, Samba, OpenSSH, sendmail, DNS, NFS, FTP, NIS and LDAP,

  iptables (all of which are included with Fedora/RHEL).

• Describes how to set up a CUPS printer server.
• Describes how to set up and use a DHCP server.

Programming

• Covers programming tools including the GNU

  gcc compiler, the

  gdb debugger,

  make, and CVS for managing source code.

• Explains how to debug a C program.
• Describes how to work with shared libraries.
• Provides a complete chapter on shell programming using

  bash, including many examples.

Details

Chapter 1 presents a brief history of Linux and explains some of the features that make it a cutting-edge operating system. The “Conventions Used in This Book” (page 16) section details the typefaces and terminology this book uses.

Part I, “Installing Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux,” discusses how to install Fedora/RHEL. Chapter 2 presents an overview of the process of installing Fedora/RHEL, including hardware requirements, downloading and burning a CD/DVD, and planning the layout of the hard disk. Chapter 3 is a step-by-step guide to installing either Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux and covers installing from a CD/DVD, a live session, a local hard disk, and installing over the network using FTP, NFS, or HTTP. It also shows how to set up the X Window System and customize your graphical user interface (GUI).

Part II, “Getting Started with Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux,” familiarizes you with Fedora/RHEL, covering logging in, the GUI, utilities, the filesystem, and the shell. Chapter 4 introduces desktop features, including the panel and the Main menu; explains how to use Konqueror to manage files, run programs, and browse the Web; and covers finding documentation, dealing with login problems, and using the window manager. Chapter 5 introduces the shell command line interface, describes more than 30 useful utilities, and presents a tutorial on the

vim text editor. Chapter 6 discusses the Linux hierarchical filesystem, covering files, filenames, pathnames, working with directories, access permissions, and hard and symbolic links. Chapter 7 introduces the Bourne Again Shell (

bash) and discusses command line arguments and options, redirecting input to and output from commands, running programs in the background, and using the shell to generate and expand filenames.

TIP: Experienced users may want to skim Part II
If you have used a UNIX or Linux system before, you may want to skim over or skip some or all of the chapters in Part II. All readers should take a look at “Conventions Used in This Book” (page 16), which explains the typographic and layout conventions that this book uses, and “Getting the Facts: Where to Find Documentation” (page 114), which points out both local and remote sources of Linux/Fedora/RHEL documentation.

Part III, “Digging into Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux,” goes into more detail about working with the system. Chapter 8 discusses the GUI and includes a section on how to run a graphical program on a remote system and have the display appear locally. The section on GNOME describes GNOME utilities and explains how to use the Nautilus file manager, including its spatial view, while the section on KDE explains more about Konqueror and KDE utilities. Chapter 9 extends the

bash coverage from Chapter 7, explaining how to redirect error output, avoid overwriting files, and work with job control, processes, startup files, important shell builtin commands, parameters, shell variables, and aliases. Chapter 10 explains networks, network security, and the Internet and discusses types of networks, subnets, protocols, addresses, hostnames, and various network utilities. The section on distributed computing describes the client/server model and some of the servers you can use on a network. Details of setting up and using clients and servers are reserved until Part V.

Part IV covers system administration. Chapter 11 discusses core concepts such as Superuser, SELinux (Security Enhanced Linux), system operation, general information about how to set up a server, DHCP, and PAM. Chapter 12 explains the Linux filesystem, going into detail about types of files, including special and device files, the use of

fsck to verify the integrity of and repair filesystems, and the use of

tune2fs to change filesystem parameters. Chapter 13 explains how to keep a system up-todate by downloading software from the Internet and installing it, including examples of using yum, BitTorrent, and RHEL’s

up2date utility. Chapter 14 explains how to set up the CUPS printing system so you can print on the local system as well as on remote systems. Chapter 15 details customizing and building a Linux kernel. Chapter 16 covers additional administration tasks, including setting up user accounts, backing up files, scheduling automated tasks, tracking disk usage, and solving general problems. Chapter 17 explains how to set up a local area network (LAN), including both hardware (including wireless) and software setup.

Part V goes into detail about setting up and running servers and connecting to them with clients. The chapters in this part of the book cover the following clients/servers:

• OpenSSH—Set up an OpenSSH server and use

  sh,

  scp, and

  sftp to communicate securely over the Internet.

• FTP—Set up a vsftpd secure FTP server and use any of several FTP clients to exchange files with the server.
• Mail—Configure sendmail and use Webmail, POP3, or IMAP to retrieve email; use SpamAssassin to combat spam.
• NIS and LDAP—Set up NIS to facilitate system administration of a LAN and LDAP to distribute information and authenticate users over a network.
• NFS—Share filesystems between systems on a network.
• Samba—Share filesystems and printers between Windows and Linux systems.
• DNS/BIND—Set up a domain nameserver to let other systems on the Internet know the names and IP addresses of local systems they may need to contact.
• iptables—Share a single Internet connection between systems on a LAN and set up a firewall to protect local systems.
• Apache—Set up an HTTP server that serves Web pages that browsers can display.

Part VI covers programming. Chapter 27 discusses programming tools and environments available under Fedora/RHEL, including the C programming language and debugger,

make, shared libraries, and source code management using CVS. Chapter 28 goes into greater depth about shell programming using

bash, with the discussion being enhanced by extensive examples.

Part VII includes appendixes on regular expressions, helpful Web sites, system security, and free software. This part also includes an extensive glossary with more than 500 entries and a comprehensive index.Supplements

The author’s home page (www.sobell.com) contains downloadable listings of the longer programs from this book as well as pointers to many interesting and useful Linux sites on the World Wide Web, a list of corrections to the book, answers to even-numbered exercises, and a solicitation for corrections, comments, and suggestions.

Table of Contents

• Chapter 1: Welcome to Linux
• Part I: Installing Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• Chapter 2: Installation
• Chapter 3: Step-by-Step Installation
• Part II: Using Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• Chapter 4: Introduction to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• Chapter 5: The Shell
• Chapter 6: The Linux Filesystem
• Chapter 7: The Linux Utilities
• Chapter 8: Networking and the Internet
• Part III: System Administration
• Chapter 9: The Bourne Again Shell (bash)
• Chapter 10: System Administration: Core Concepts
• Chapter 11: Files, Directories, and Filesystems
• Chapter 12: Finding, Downloading, and Installing Software
• Chapter 13: Printing with CUPS
• Chapter 14: Building a Linux Kernel
• Chapter 15: Administration Tasks
• Chapter 16: Configuring and Monitoring a LAN
• Chapter 17: Setting Up Virtual Machines Locally and in the Cloud
• Part IV: Using Clients and Setting Up Servers
• Chapter 18: OpenSSH: Secure Network Communication
• Chapter 19: FTP: Transferring Files Across a Network
• Chapter 20: sendmail: Setting Up Mail Servers, Clients, and More
• Chapter 21: NIS and LDAP
• Chapter 22: NFS: Sharing Directory Hierarchies
• Chapter 23: Samba: Linux and Windows File and Printer Sharing
• Chapter 24: DNS/BIND: Tracking Domain Names and Addresses
• Chapter 25: firewalld and iptables: Setting Up a Firewall
• Chapter 26: Apache (httpd): Setting Up a Web Server
• Part V: Programming Tools
• Chapter 27: Programming the Bourne Again Shell (bash)
• Chapter 28: The Python Programming Language
• Chapter 29: The MariaDB SQL Database Management System
• Part VI: Appendixes
• Appendix A: Regular Expressions
• Appendix B: Help
• Appendix C: Security Including GPG
• Appendix D: Keeping the System Up-to-Date Using apt-get
• Appendix E: LPI and CompTIA Certification

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Previous Editions of A Practical Guide to Fedora™ and Red Hat® Enterprise Linux®

“Since I’m in an educational environment, I found the content of Sobell’s book to be right on target and very helpful for anyone managing Linux in the enterprise. His style of writing is very clear. He builds up to the chapter exercises, which I find to be relevant to real-world scenarios a user or admin would encounter. An IT/IS student would find this book a valuable complement to their education. The vast amount of information is extremely well balanced and Sobell manages to present the content without complicated asides and meandering prose. This is a ‘must have’ for anyone managing Linux systems in a networked environment or anyone running a Linux server. I would also highly recommend it to an experienced computer user who is moving to the Linux platform.”

–Mary Norbury, IT Director, Barbara Davis Center, University of Colorado at Denver, from a review posted on slashdot.org

“I had the chance to use your UNIX books when I when was in college years ago at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, CA. I have to say that your books are among the best! They’re quality books that teach the theoretical aspects and applications of the operating system.”

–Benton Chan, IS Engineer

“The book has more than lived up to my expectations from the many reviews I read, even though it targets FC2. I have found something very rare with your book: It doesn’t read like the standard technical text, it reads more like a story. It’s a pleasure to read and hard to put down. Did I say that?! :-)”

–David Hopkins, Business Process Architect

“Thanks for your work and for the book you wrote. There are really few books that can help people to become more efficient administrators of different workstations. We hope (in Russia) that you will continue bringing us a new level of understanding of Linux/UNIX systems.”

–Anton Petukhov

“Mark Sobell has written a book as approachable as it is authoritative.”

–Jeffrey Bianchine, Advocate, Author, Journalist

“Excellent reference book, well suited for the sysadmin of a Linux cluster, or the owner of a PC contemplating installing a recent stable Linux. Don’t be put off by the daunting heft of the book. Sobell has striven to be as inclusive as possible, in trying to anticipate your system administration needs.”

–Wes Boudville, Inventor

“A Practical Guide to Red Hat® Linux® is a brilliant book. Thank you, Mark Sobell.”

–C. Pozrikidis, University of California at San Diego

“This book presents the best overview of the Linux operating system that I have found. . . . [It] should be very helpful and understandable no matter what the reader’s background: traditional UNIX user, new Linux devotee, or even Windows user. Each topic is presented in a clear, complete fashion and very few assumptions are made about what the reader knows. . . . The book is extremely useful as a reference, as it contains a 70-page glossary of terms and is very well indexed. It is organized in such a way that the reader can focus on simple tasks without having to wade through more advanced topics until they are ready.”

–Cam Marshall, Marshall Information Service LLC, Member of Front Range UNIX Users Group [FRUUG], Boulder, Colorado

“Conclusively, this is THE book to get if you are a new Linux user and you just got into RH/Fedora world. There’s no other book that discusses so many different topics and in such depth.”

–Eugenia Loli-Queru, Editor in Chief, OSNews.com

Praise for Other Books by Mark G. Sobell

“This book is a very useful tool for anyone who wants to ‘look under the hood’ so to speak, and really start putting the power of Linux to work. What I find particularly frustrating about man pages is that they never include examples. Sobell, on the other hand, outlines very clearly what the command does and then gives several common, easy-to-understand examples that make it a breeze to start shell programming on one’s own. As with Sobell’s other works, this is simple, straightforward, and easy to read. It’s a great book and will stay on the shelf at easy arm’s reach for a long time.”

–Ray Bartlett, Travel Writer

“Overall I found this book to be quite excellent, and it has earned a spot on the very front of my bookshelf. It covers the real ‘guts’ of Linux–the command line and its utilities–and does so very well. Its strongest points are the outstanding use of examples, and the Command Reference section. Highly recommended for Linux users of all skill levels. Well done to Mark Sobell and Prentice Hall for this outstanding book!”

–Dan Clough, Electronics Engineer and Slackware Linux User

“Totally unlike most Linux books, this book avoids discussing everything via GUI and jumps right into making the power of the command line your friend.”

–Bjorn Tipling, Software Engineer, ask.com

“This book is the best distro-agnostic, foundational Linux reference I’ve ever seen, out of dozens of Linux-related books I’ve read. Finding this book was a real stroke of luck. If you want to really understand how to get things done at the command line, where the power and flexibility of free UNIX-like OSes really live, this book is among the best tools you’ll find toward that end.”

–Chad Perrin, Writer, TechRepublic

“I currently own one of your books, A Practical Guide to Linux®. I believe this book is one of the most comprehensive and, as the title says, practical guides to Linux I have ever read. I consider myself a novice and I come back to this book over and over again.”

–Albert J. Nguyen

“Thank you for writing a book to help me get away from Windows XP and to never touch Windows Vista. The book is great; I am learning a lot of new concepts and commands. Linux is definitely getting easier to use.”

–James Moritz

“I am so impressed by how Mark Sobell can approach a complex topic in such an understandable manner. His command examples are especially useful in providing a novice (or even an advanced) administrator with a cookbook on how to accomplish real-world tasks on Linux. He is truly an inspired technical writer!”

–George Vish II, Senior Education Consultant, Hewlett-Packard Company

“Overall, I think it’s a great, comprehensive Ubuntu book that’ll be a valuable resource for people of all technical levels.”

–John Dong, Ubuntu Forum Council Member, Backports Team Leader

“The JumpStart sections really offer a quick way to get things up and running, allowing you to dig into the details of the book later.”

–Scott Mann, Aztek Networks

“I would so love to be able to use this book to teach a class about not just Ubuntu or Linux but about computers in general. It is thorough and well written with good illustrations that explain important concepts for computer usage.”

–Nathan Eckenrode, New York Local Community Team

“Ubuntu is gaining popularity at the rate alcohol did during Prohibition, and it’s great to see a well-known author write a book on the latest and greatest version. Not only does it contain Ubuntu-specific information, but it also touches on general computer-related topics, which will help the average computer user to better understand what’s going on in the background. Great work, Mark!”

–Daniel R. Arfsten, Pro/ENGINEER Drafter/Designer

“I read a lot of Linux technical information every day, but I’m rarely impressed by tech books. I usually prefer online information sources instead. Mark Sobell’s books are a notable exception. They’re clearly written, technically accurate, comprehensive, and actually enjoyable to read.”

–Matthew Miller, Senior Systems Analyst/Administrator, BU Linux Project, Boston University Officeof Information Technology

“This is well written, clear, comprehensive information for the Linux user of any type, whether trying Ubuntu on for the first time and wanting to know a little about it, or using the book as a very good reference when doing something more complicated like setting up a server. This book’s value goes well beyond its purchase price and it’ll make a great addition to the Linux section of your bookshelf.”

–Linc Fessenden, Host of The LinuxLink TechShow, tllts.org

“The author has done a very good job at clarifying such a detail-oriented operating system. I have extensive Unix and Windows experience and this text does an excellent job at bridging the gaps between Linux, Windows, and Unix. I highly recommend this book to both ‘newbs’ and experienced users. Great job!”

–Mark Polczynski, Information Technology Consultant

“When I first started working with Linux just a short 10 years or so ago, it was a little more difficult than now to get going. . . . Now, someone new to the community has a vast array of resources available on the web, or if they are inclined to begin with Ubuntu, they can literally find almost every single thing they will need in the single volume of Mark Sobell’s A Practical Guide to Ubuntu Linux®.

“I’m sure this sounds a bit like hyperbole. Everything a person would need to know? Obviously not everything, but this book, weighing in at just under 1200 pages, covers so much so thoroughly that there won’t be much left out. From install to admin, networking, security, shell scripting, package management, and a host of other topics, it is all there. GUI and command line tools are covered. There is not really any wasted space or fluff, just a huge amount of information. There are screen shots when appropriate but they do not take up an inordinate amount of space. This book is information-dense.”

–JR Peck, Editor, GeekBook.org

“I have been wanting to make the jump to Linux but did not have the guts to do so–until I saw your familiarly titled A Practical Guide to Red Hat® Linux® at the bookstore. I picked up a copy and am eagerly looking forward to regaining my freedom.”

–Carmine Stoffo, Machine and Process Designer to pharmaceutical industry

“I am currently reading A Practical Guide to Red Hat® Linux® and am finally understanding the true power of the command line. I am new to Linux and your book is a treasure.”

–Juan Gonzalez

“Overall, A Practical Guide to Ubuntu Linux® by Mark G. Sobell provides all of the information a beginner to intermediate user of Linux would need to be productive. The inclusion of the Live DVD of the Gutsy Gibbon release of Ubuntu makes it easy for the user to test-drive Linux without affecting his installed OS. I have no doubts that you will consider this book money well spent.”

–Ray Lodato, Slashdot contributor, www.slashdot.org

From the Publisher