In Unix: Visual QuickStart Guide, the authors take the time to explain correct Unix lingo as well as concepts and processes to be aware of as a daily user. The real-life implication of reading Unix is not only that you won't receive irate messages from your system administrator, but that you'll be able to manipulate your Unix environment, making it a genuinely enjoyable workspace.

For more experienced users, there are plenty of cool tools and shortcuts to make the book worthwhile (sdiff, head, and procmail, for example). The authors provide a generous section on scripting--a good introduction for advanced users who may be spending too much time on repetitive tasks. The authors also touch on how to intelligently include regular expressions in searching, a pleasant addition to an already outstanding section.

Some of the authors' decisions on what to include merit warning, although not enough that users should turn away from this book: the authors only cover the bash, ksh, and csh shells; they focus on only the pico and vi editors--not emacs; and their excellent section on e-mail covers only pine (briefly mentioning that elm really isn't worth its salt for a new user). While the book isn't all-inclusive, it isn't meant to be. The authors make their preferences clear, and for the user, this amounts to a good deal of clarity and time saved. --Jennifer Buckendorff

From Library Journal

UNIX, the life blood of the Internet, is really a pretty simple operating system compared with Windows 95/98/NT. UNIX is actually a superset of the old DOS operating system, and the complexity of UNIX comes from its command line interface (i.e., no graphical user interface). To use the full power of UNIX, the user must know what to type, not simply answer questions. The Rays' book is an excellent beginner's guide and covers everything from viewing and manipulating files and directories to editing files with either VI or Pico to configuring environmental variables, running shell scripts, reading E-mail, encoding and decoding data, and installing software. While not for everyone, this should be popular in both public and academic libraries.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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14 Reviews

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4.7 out of 5 stars (14 customer reviews)

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5.0 out of 5 stars Helped me through a semester at school, May 6 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Unix: Visual QuickStart Guide (Paperback)

Last semester, I found myself in a class that assumed the students were familiar with working in UNIX. However, I was not and was having a very difficult time. Out of desperation, I picked up this book. In no time, I was having a much better time figuring out what to do. UNIX Visual Quickstart Guide was easy to follow. The descriptions were to the point without a bunch of unnecessary words and detail.

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5.0 out of 5 stars An extremely easy-to-follow reference, May 15 2003

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Unix: Visual QuickStart Guide (Paperback)

Now in an updated and expanded second edition, Unix is a Peachpit Press "Visual QuickStart Guide" that relies heavily on pictures and examples to quickly instruct users in the basics of operating in Unix, from creating and editing files to writing simple scripts, sending and receiving email, accessing the internet, and much more. The collaborative effort of Unix computer experts Deborah S. Ray and Eric J. Ray, Unix is an extremely easy-to-follow reference highly recommended for non-specialist general readers seeking to learn about and acquire a familiarity with the Unix environment.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Useful book, Mar 18 2003

Bunny Bear (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: UNIX: Visual QuickStart Guide (Paperback)

This book contains a lot of worthless material due to the fact that my job does not require knowing, such as the topics on the internet, e-mail, and installing UNIX software, but of course, for other users this stuff might be useful. The small bit of information that was useful has certainly made a large difference in my daily workings with UNIX, which more than compensates for the sections that were not useful. Such topics include the uses of the semicolon, piping, redirecting, and scripts. The book is easy to read, sells at a good price, and contains good reference appendixes.

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Most recent customer reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Starter Book
I looked at many many intro books, and this was the best one out there by far. Although a visual UNIX book sounds strange, the visual part means that the author provides examples... Read more

Published on Feb 17 2003 by amsainz

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Basic Unix Reference
This is a concise, readable, practical guide to all of the fundamental things one needs to do in Unix. It's excellent. Read more

Published on April 12 2002 by Brad Harding