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Michael Kerrisk

The Linux Programming Interface: A Linux and UNIX System Programming Handbook Hardcover – Oct. 1 2010

by Michael Kerrisk (Author)

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The Linux Programming Interface is the definitive guide to the Linux and UNIX programming interface—the interface employed by nearly every application that runs on a Linux or UNIX system.

In this authoritative work, Linux programming expert Michael Kerrisk provides detailed descriptions of the system calls and library functions that you need in order to master the craft of system programming, and accompanies his explanations with clear, complete example programs.

You'll find descriptions of over 500 system calls and library functions, and more than 200 example programs, 88 tables, and 115 diagrams. You'll learn how to:

Read and write files efficiently
Use signals, clocks, and timers
Create processes and execute programs
Write secure programs
Write multithreaded programs using POSIX threads
Build and use shared libraries
Perform interprocess communication using pipes, message queues, shared memory, and semaphores
Write network applications with the sockets API

While The Linux Programming Interface covers a wealth of Linux-specific features, including epoll, inotify, and the /proc file system, its emphasis on UNIX standards (POSIX.1-2001/SUSv3 and POSIX.1-2008/SUSv4) makes it equally valuable to programmers working on other UNIX platforms.

The Linux Programming Interface is the most comprehensive single-volume work on the Linux and UNIX programming interface, and a book that's destined to become a new classic.

Praise for The Linux Programming Interface

"If I had to choose a single book to sit next to my machine when writing software for Linux, this would be it."—Martin Landers, Software Engineer, Google

"This book, with its detailed descriptions and examples, contains everything you need to understand the details and nuances of the low-level programming APIs in Linux . . . no matter what the level of reader, there will be something to be learnt from this book."—Mel Gorman, Author of Understanding the Linux Virtual Memory Manager

"Michael Kerrisk has not only written a great book about Linux programming and how it relates to various standards, but has also taken care that bugs he noticed got fixed and the man pages were (greatly) improved. In all three ways, he has made Linux programming easier. The in-depth treatment of topics in The Linux Programming Interface . . . makes it a must-have reference for both new and experienced Linux programmers."—Andreas Jaeger, Program Manager, openSUSE, Novell

"Michael's inexhaustible determination to get his information right, and to express it clearly and concisely, has resulted in a strong reference source for programmers. While this work is targeted at Linux programmers, it will be of value to any programmer working in the UNIX/POSIX ecosystem."—David Butenhof, Author of Programming with POSIX Threads and Contributor to the POSIX and UNIX Standards

". . . a very thorough—yet easy to read—explanation of UNIX system and network programming, with an emphasis on Linux systems. It's certainly a book I'd recommend to anybody wanting to get into UNIX programming (in general) or to experienced UNIX programmers wanting to know 'what's new' in the popular GNU/Linux system."—Fernando Gont, Network Security Researcher, IETF Participant, and RFC Author

". . . encyclopedic in the breadth and depth of its coverage, and textbook-like in its wealth of worked examples and exercises. Each topic is clearly and comprehensively covered, from theory to hands-on working code. Professionals, students, educators, this is the Linux/UNIX reference that you have been waiting for."—Anthony Robins, Associate Professor of Computer Science, The University of Otago

"I've been very impressed by the precision, the quality and the level of detail Michael Kerrisk put in his book. He is a great expert of Linux system calls and lets us share his knowledge and understanding of the Linux APIs."—Christophe Blaess, Author of Programmation systeme en C sous Linux

". . . an essential resource for the serious or professional Linux and UNIX systems programmer. Michael Kerrisk covers the use of all the key APIs across both the Linux and UNIX system interfaces with clear descriptions and tutorial examples and stresses the importance and benefits of following standards such as the Single UNIX Specification and POSIX 1003.1."—Andrew Josey, Director, Standards, The Open Group, and Chair of the POSIX 1003.1 Working Group

"What could be better than an encyclopedic reference to the Linux system, from the standpoint of the system programmer, written by none other than the maintainer of the man pages himself? The Linux Programming Interface is comprehensive and detailed. I firmly expect it to become an indispensable addition to my programming bookshelf."—Bill Gallmeister, Author of POSIX.4 Programmer's Guide: Programming for the Real World

". . . the most complete and up-to-date book about Linux and UNIX system programming. If you're new to Linux system programming, if you're a UNIX veteran focused on portability while interested in learning the Linux way, or if you're simply looking for an excellent reference about the Linux programming interface, then Michael Kerrisk's book is definitely the companion you want on your bookshelf."—Loic Domaigne, Chief Software Architect (Embedded), Corpuls.com

ISBN-10

1593272200
ISBN-13

978-1593272203
Edition

1st
Publisher

No Starch Press
Publication date

Oct. 1 2010
Language

English
Dimensions

18.42 x 5.82 x 24.13 cm
Print length

1552 pages
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From the Publisher


	The Linux Command Line	Wicked Cool Shell Scripts, 2nd Edition	How Linux Works, 2nd Edition	The Linux Programming Interface
Description:	A comprehensive introduction to the command line. From the first terminal commands to writing complete programs in Bash	101 useful, customizable, and fun Bash shell scripts for Linux, OS X, and UNIX systems	An in-depth guide to the inner workings of the Linux system	The definitive guide to system and network programing in C for Linux and UNIX. Filled with detailed descriptions and complete example programs. From the Linux man-pages maintainer
User Experience Level:	All levels	All levels	Intermediate	Experienced

Product description

About the Author

Michael Kerrisk has been using and programming UNIX systems for more than 20 years, and has taught many week-long courses on UNIX system programming. Since 2004, he has maintained the man-pages project, which produces the manual pages describing the Linux kernel and glibc programming APIs. He has written or co-written more than 250 of the manual pages and is actively involved in the testing and design review of new Linux kernel-userspace interfaces. Michael lives with his family in Munich, Germany.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ No Starch Press; 1st edition (Oct. 1 2010)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 1552 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1593272200
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1593272203
Item weight ‏ : ‎ 2.29 kg
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 18.42 x 5.82 x 24.13 cm

Best Sellers Rank: #76,525 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #3 in Linux & Unix Programming
- #9 in Unix Operating System
- #10 in Linux Programming

Customer Reviews:
604 ratings

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Michael Kerrisk

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I'm a New Zealand-born, Munich-based programmer, trainer, and writer who has been programming and using various UNIX systems since 1987, and focusing primarily on Linux since the late 1990s. Since 2004, have been the maintainer of the Linux man-pages project (http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/), which documents the Linux and GNU C library programming APIs. As part of that work, I'm actively involved in the Linux development community, providing testing and design review of changes to the Linux kernel-user-space API. I write and deliver training courses on Linux/UNIX system programming and related areas. Those courses draw on many years of teaching and programming experience and a long and intimate association with the UNIX and Linux programming APIs to create superlative training courses. For more details, see http://man7.org/training/.

Customer reviews

4.8 out of 5

604 global ratings

5 star		91%
4 star		5%
3 star		2%
2 star		1%
1 star		1%

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Michael Lefebvre

Very good for linux programmers

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on February 25, 2023

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Very good

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Read and think

An incredibly well written book

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on July 18, 2017

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I have read a lot of technical books (principally windows and c++ related) and really I have NEVER seen a technical book as well written as this one.
The book has all the quality I always wanted:
1) it must be thorough: after reading you shouldn't need to read other book or search the web to complete your comprehension: every info you need must be there.
2) it must be clear: there should never be any ambiguity in expressions or situation that requires you to test the info on specific example. You must be able to understand it on first the first reading
3) it must be a pleasant journey: the order of the information should match the normal flow of your thinking and interrogations. The author should guide you so that when you think: "I wonder what would happen in this different situation", the next paragraphs do address that interrogation you have.
Again this book does all this extremely well. There is simply no equivalent in the windows world. It makes me learning linux a very pleasant experience.
Many many thanks Mr Kerrisk

5 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Will recommend.

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on May 15, 2021

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Compared to other books on Linux in the market. I found this book more useful.

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Md. Sayed Sekandar

Best book for Linux programming.

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on November 4, 2021

Verified Purchase

Best guide for Linux Programming.

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on October 4, 2020

Verified Purchase

Arrivée en parfaite condition, j'ai seulement commencé la lecture et je suis loin de l'avoir fini mais pour l'instant tout est très bien expliqué et ce en détails!

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on August 29, 2020

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I am enjoying studying unix, I have a few different books it is coming along, but I still have a long way to go. Bill Reid

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Amazon Customer

Lots of good stuff but was hoping this was a much more ...

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on September 21, 2017

Verified Purchase

4 stars because it is a year 2010 edition. Did not notice in the title. Lots of good stuff but was hoping this was a much more recent edition. Unfortunately it is a 2010 edition. Still it has quite a lot of good information for developers looking at getting an in depth understanding of UNIX as a whole and LINUX in particular.

Arshad.

2 people found this helpful

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Neil S. Rieck

Programmer "must have"

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on January 17, 2018

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This massive hardcover book weighs in at 2.8 Kg (6.17 pounds) and is the most complete book I have ever seen on this topic. The title is slightly inaccurate because this book also covers various flavors of UNIX, as well as C programming in, and out of, a POSIX environment. Anyone learning to write C/C++ programs on Linux/UNIX this side of y2k should buy this book.

3 people found this helpful

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webbje

Beautifully written book

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on June 2, 2017

Verified Purchase

Beautifully written book, a model of clarity and succinctness, equivalent to K&R's C Programming Language book, but surprisingly readable from front to back too. I've been working with Unix and Linux since both became available in the UK and I think they're both beautiful from an engineering viewpoint, but often they're not well explained from a systems programming perspective. This book - along with W. Richard Stevens' book, "Advanced Programming in The Unix Environment" - are the best available on the subject in my humble view. I particularly like Kerrisk's because he obviously thought long and hard about the best way to present the material in a narrative format in the opening part of the book where he walks through key concepts, but then he shows the same consideration in each subsequent chapter where he does more of a deep-dive into each kernel subsystem, meaning that it's a book that readers can return to again and again when they want to explore a topic in more depth. It's also a very comprehensive programmer's guide - the coverage is excellent, and the material is bang up-to-date.

7 people found this helpful

D. Watson

The most fun I've ever had writing C as a beginner

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on September 17, 2020

Verified Purchase

Typical C books are boring, dry and all follow the same structure, they give you the foundations with no real direction on how you progress to be useful.

This book is specific to Linux, it provides examples of C code to do X,Y,Z, detailed descriptions about the inner workings of Linux. I'm a tester, I don't need to write C (that's just my current hobby) but the knowledge behind processes are fantastic.

2 people found this helpful

David Walker

A "must have" for any Linux programmer

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 28, 2010

Verified Purchase

Last week I got my grubby mitts on a clean, white and shiny new copy of The Linux Programming Interface ("A Linux and UNIX System Programming Handbook") by Michael Kerrisk.

So far I've read only a few chapters in detail, skimmed over one or two others, and dived around in it to look some things up. Just a week after receiving it is probably too soon for a fair review of such an enormous book, but Michael asked me if I would consider writing one (after I contacted him -- I don't know him personally), and it's the least I can do to thank him for what I can already tell is going to be a stupendously useful book.

From its uncluttered no-nonsense title and cover design, right down to its nitty-gritty technical details, it's obvious that this is a clear, well thought out, and well written book by someone who knows their subject matter inside and out. That's no surprise: Michael Kerrisk is maintainer and a major contributor to the Linux man-pages project. But let's be clear, this book isn't just a bunch of man pages glued together and given a cover!

Despite its large size (over 60 chapters, 1500+ pages) and level of detail, this is a surprisingly readable guidebook for UNIX system calls with a particular focus on Linux. The chapters are arranged such that they can be read in order with minimal forward-referencing. Topics covered range from the history of UNIX and fundamental systems concepts, through file i/o and file systems, processes & threads, IPC, up to advanced socket techniques and alternative I/O models. The book has a fairly comprehensive (although not exhaustive) index. The chapter list at man7.org provides a complete picture. The IPC chapters by themselves look as good as any other book I've seen on the subject.

The topics are covered in enough detail to make the book useful as a reference, but retaining a readable style throughout. It does a good job of pointing out some of the UNIX and C library quirks that might get lost in the detail of pure reference material. The book doesn't stray too far from the main focus -- the system calls themselves -- and provides references to other sources that cover related topics in more detail. There are plenty of diagrams and examples, including source code (available from man7.org). Source examples tend to be fairly simple illustrations of individual or related system calls. The book is not too code-heavy and doesn't just go through the motions of listing every possible call and parameter. After all, you already have the freely-available man pages for that. (It's occasionally useful to have a BASH prompt to hand while reading it.)

This isn't a beginner's book: a certain level of basic UNIX/Linux knowledge and a good grasp of C programming is a pre-requisite to a book like this. There is a good balance of introductory and advanced material without "dumbing down" or sacrificing of important detail.

The chapters on sockets, while quite short, cover a surprising amount of detailed ground, although a discussion of some of the more important TCP options available with setsockopt() is notably lacking. To be fair, this isn't a socket-programming book, and references to other sources of information are provided. However, I did think this was an odd omission considering the level of detail provided elsewhere in the book.

There are some exercises at the end of chapters with selected answers provided. I think this is one area that could be expanded and improved for readers who might want to treat the book like a `self-study' course or use it in an educational environment.

Any book this size with this level of technical detail inevitably has some errors, and it was after reporting one (minor) mistake that the author asked if I would consider posting a review. However, I was apparently only the second person to report one! Considering how many eyes must have glanced over this book already, that surely says something about the book's accuracy. The book has its own web page on the author's site (man7.org) where there is an errata section and a list of kernel changes since the book was released. It looks like this book will be well supported, even as the Linux kernel continues to march on its evolutionary path.

As you can probably tell from the overall tone of this review, I'm very pleased with my purchase. I plan to read this cover-to-cover over the next couple of months, and I will probably get a second copy on expenses to sit on my desk at work! I may post a follow-up review later, once I've had more time to read and reflect.

I would recommend this book to any Linux programmer.

27 people found this helpful

Tom Gahan

Superb

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on April 25, 2015

Verified Purchase

In my 45 years of computer experience I have come across several outstanding documents that have supported my coding: "IBM System 360 Principles of Operation", the set of RSX11/M manuals, and K&R. This book stands proudly on my bookshelves beside them.

However, I dislike the binding, which does injustice to an otherwise outstanding book. It is listed as a hardback, yet is a glued paperback with hard covers. Amazon should should stop misrepresenting "perfect bindings" as hardbacks/case bindings.

9 people found this helpful

Cliente Amazon

Great Book.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 15, 2022

Verified Purchase

It's all about precious things to know, when programming in the Linux architecture.

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The Linux Programming Interface: A Linux and UNIX System Programming Handbook Hardcover – Oct. 1 2010

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