MAC OS X Unix 101: 101 Byte-sized Projects

By Adrian Mayo

Unix is no longer someone else's OS. With Mac OS X built on top of it, Unix? is becoming a household name, and more and more Mac users are ready to take it on. This book is for them! Based on a... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0321374118
• ISBN13: 9780321374110
• Release Date: January 2005
• Publisher: Peachpit Pr
• Length: 614 Pages
• Weight: 2.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 1.3" x 7.3"

Customer Reviews

Welcome to the Terminal: Among the best of available titles introducing UNIX to Mac users

Along with Matisse Enzer's Unix for Mac OS 10.4/Tiger, this is just about the best available title introducing Unix to the Mac user. There are lots of other great *Nix titles oriented variously at different levels of experience and user needs, but for the Mac Power User this is an excellent starting point. The book assumes both a level of confidence and good sense (RTFM!) that isn't always that common. You know who you are. The organization of this book into "projects" is one of its big strengths. It claims to proceed from simple to complex, from common to obscure, though I dont really see that. *Each chapter presents a small topic (such as aliases and functions), and treats it in pretty great depth, with examples, exercises, and especially terrific cross references to other chapters/projects. This makes it easy to find the section matching what you want and need to do. On the other hand, topics are not all grouped intuitively right next to each other in series, though it is a remarkably easy to navigate book. *You could read this book through, trying everything out as you went, but that would be tedious. Having the book on your desk for reference when needed, and also taking a crack at new subjects for fun and education's sake when you have a few free minutes, Mayo has put together a really terrific resource that I strongly recommend. *Nearly exhaustive, what this book doesn't cover falls into the realm of the truly advanced and specialized, and what it misses in depth it fully admits to and refers the reader on to sources that can aid him. This book does not cover Leopard specifically (though it does cover the PPC/Intel differences, in areas such as nvram and sysctl, among others), but fear not. *Although Leopard is a huge leap forward, most things Unix have not appreciably changed since Panther/10.3.x, and even if not revised again this title should continue to be a great tool going forward even into Snow Leopard (whenever that arrives. . .) UPDATE 4/20/10: I upgraded my Macs to Snow Leopard earlier this month when the 10.6.3 update came out, and have reviewed this book again, and have found that ALL commands and projects I tried (about 10% of the total) continue to work 100%, and exactly as noted in this book, input and output. Quite a statement since the book was written for Tiger/10.4.x (with the author having a developer's beta of Leopard 10.5) over three years ago. Recommended now MORE than ever, now that with the help of this title in part, I have graduated to full-blown Mac-Unix geek from almost rank beginner when I bought Mayo's book.

Great for helping with Unix

I've gotten this book a few months ago, and I am still using it for reference with the Unix side of Mac OS X. This book is great for those "little projects" that someone may want to do on there lunch break or just to get to know the Unix side of Mac OS X.

A taste of 'geekdom'

There's a not-so-fine line between knowing your instrument, which serves a specific purpose or purposes, & being a geek. This book walks the line. There's so much more we, as Mac-users, can gain from understanding UNIX, but, of course, there's a limit to how much time & effort can be invested into gaining this insight. I look at it this way: the time, frustration & money I save just by being able to competently maintain, get around limitations of the OSX interface & repair my system is more than enough compensation. This is the easiest to follow & understand of many UNIX books I've read, or attempted to read. If you have a little patience, this book will bestow rewards.