Customer Reviews

Learning the bash Shell: Unix Shell Programming

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The GNU/Linux bash shell is a clunky marvel. Novices recoil at first contact; “how do I click my way out of this 70s-era greenscreen abomination?” Casual Linux admins--and I fall into this it-was-set-up-a-year-ago-and-still-works-fine-so-don’t-futz-with-it category--are reasonably adept at piping, redirection, and tab-completion. The full-bore Linux geekorati are only a couple of Emacs meta-ctrl-popbottle keystrokes from involuntary carpal retirement.

Learning the bash Shell is really intended for the second of these groups: the not-everyday Linux enthusiast. The experts will have already glommed every tip and trick, and, despite the disingenuous "Learning" in the title, the book’s too steep a road for folks still struggling to install their first RPM.

O’Reilly is known for its content-dense publications, and this book has a higher fact-per-unit-volume ratio than any other of that publisher’s titles that I could name. Like many a tech trade tome, its chapters should be read as you need them, not straight through from copyright to colophon ("Typeset with ITC Garamond, you say. Fascinating!"). I go ahead and store it right next to the server. A quick peek will tell me everything I need to know, and little I don’t care to learn, about test/[] switches, string substitution operators, special-case environment variables, file descriptor redirection, Emacs control commands, process substitution, and those darned umask settings (each an example of something I use often, yet the details of which I can never recall). And once you’ve got the book open, you’ll find it just leads you further and further down the bash rabbit hole.

In short, this is one of the best tech books I’ve ever encountered, for any OS, for any topic. If you’re of the aforementioned casual Linuxfolk, or transcending your way to the guru plane, you must add it to your library.

This O'Reilly Publication does a good job in filling a void for a good introduction to Bash Shell scripting. Bash has become the shell script programming choice for most Unix and Linux shell programmers, because of its strengths over C shell (Csh) and other Unix-based Shell environments as a fairly robust freeware script programming language.

Strengths of the publication are the clear explanations of the bash shell programming environment, the effective use of tables to summarize basic shell language and programming constructs, UNIX-based utilities, shell environment customization, shell Syntax, Bash File Operators and control key definitions.

A chapter is devoted to edit mode capabilities (both eMacs and Vi Command-Line Editing Commands are covered and summarized effectively in clearly doucmented tables).

The book contains a number of terse script programming tasks, which provide clear examples of the material presented in the text. These program examples are reworked to provide a clear example of how Bash scripts can be modified to provide greater flexibility and reusability of Bash shell program code.

I would like to see more robust programming shell examples in the book as examples of mini-applications, which Bash is frequently used for in many Unix-based or Unix-derived platforms. The "Task 5-1" program example is an example where a good example of a program, which does an adequate job of clearly covering the use of Bash File Operators, yet the author(s) make the statement that the code is "relatively long winded".

Another area the book could address is the use of Bash in a Windows environment. I was able to port some of the programming tasks presented to a Windows 95/98 environment using the GNU Bash Version 2.03 for Windows package available on the internet.

Despite these drawbacks, I rate the book four stars on the strengths that it is the only readily-available publication, which is solely devoted to Bash shell use and programming. The O'Reilly publication is definitely worth the investment, if you are looking for a book to get you started on Bash Shell Script programming on a Unix, Linux or Windows (to a limited degree) environment.

I like this book a lot. It covers all you need to know to fell comfortable with bash shell. However I find the explanation confusing, sometimes I had to read the same paragraph twice to figure out what did the author mean. Also it's not good to use as a reference, since a lot of code depends on previous examples, so one needs to go back to find where this came from. All in all a very good book, didn't see better one, so far.

Good starter for those taking their first steps in unix shell scripting. The book is easy to read, with examples that are easy to follow.

For more intricate techniques get the "Unix Power Tools."

This book is an excellent resource for Linux-literate individuals. I use it to tutor students and adults on Bash shell programming. For beginners, it may be too difficult, but the people with hands-on experience will appreciate its content of the each chapter. It lacks real-world examples but with imagination and creativity, you can easily drum up a number of viable samples. This book is not for people who need to be spoon-fed.

O'Reilly has become the de facto for techie books. They are immensely helpful when you just want to dig your feet in and get hardcore with coding. They make for easy reads. Examples are practical and clear.

I find this book to be a great reference tool when working on the Unix command line in the Bash Shell environment. I highly recommend this book if not for reading purposes but as an excellent source of feedback if you are not sure what commands you should be using.

Whilst you do have manpages, which are often handy, this book brings you clarity and elaboration when coding may not come to you that easy as it does for others. Learn Bash without bashing your skull on the keyboard in frustration.

A very good introductory BASH book. The different features of BASH are covered in great detail. Beginners will definitely like the in-depth discussion and examples. The more advanced users will also find this book very useful.

The only reason I'm not giving it a "5 star" is because of the example/case used in Programming section. The author used one example to demonstrate different aspects of BASH programming. I found that example a little too complex for a beginner. Since, the whole programming section was centered around that one example, things got more confusing as advanced programming topics were introduced.
But, still it's a very usefull book.

If you are already using bash, you will probably want to skip parts of the book; nonetheless, it may tell you some shortcuts you missed. There aren't really any large programming examples, though the use of perl probably makes that less of a problem lately. Still, the authors seem to recognize the usefulness of "scripting" directly from the command line. In addition, the book includes a good deal of information on customization and on the differences between versions.

This is a great introduction to the Bash shell.
Highly recommended.

This O'Reilly Publication does a good job in filling a void for a good introduction to Bash Shell scripting. Bash has become the shell script programming choice for most Unix and Linux shell programmers, because of its strengths over C shell (Csh) and other Unix-based Shell environments as a fairly robust freeware script programming language.

Strengths of the publication are the clear explanations of the bash shell programming environment, the effective use of tables to summarize basic shell language and programming constructs, UNIX-based utilities, shell environment customization, shell Syntax, Bash File Operators and control key definitions.

A chapter is devoted to edit mode capabilities (both eMacs and Vi Command-Line Editing Commands are covered and summarized effectively in clearly doucmented tables).

The book contains a number of terse script programming tasks, which provide clear examples of the material presented in the text. These program examples are reworked to provide a clear example of how Bash scripts can be modified to provide greater flexibility and reusability of Bash shell program code.

I would like to see more robust programming shell examples in the book as examples of mini-applications, which Bash is frequently used for in many Unix-based or Unix-derived platforms. The "Task 5-1" program example is an example where a good example of a program, which does an adequate job of clearly covering the use of Bash File Operators, yet the author(s) make the statement that the code is "relatively long winded".

Another area the book could address is the use of Bash in a Windows environment. I was able to port some of the programming tasks presented to a Windows 95/98 environment using the GNU Bash Version 2.03 for Windows package available on the internet.

Despite these drawbacks, I rate the book four stars on the strengths that it is the only readily-available publication, which is solely devoted to Bash shell use and programming. The O'Reilly publication is definitely worth the investment, if you are looking for a book to get you started on Bash Shell Script programming on a Unix, Linux or Windows (to a limited degree) environment.