Without a doubt, "The Complete FreeBSD" by Greg Lehey is a very
authoritative book. FreeBSD as an operating system has evolved from being
a very simple server like OS to a very complex one that can adopted by
masses. It is not very easy to keep track of all major developments in
FreeBSD development community anymore. This book aims to explain all
facets of the latest version of FreeBSD and does a splendid job in doing
so. The intended audience of this book can be complete newbies planning to
use FreeBSD for the first time who migrated from other Unix-like platforms
or Microsoft and users/system administrators of FreeBSD. Also system
programmers of FreeBSD who want to know various interrelationships across
subsystems will benefit from his book. The book delves into
pre-installation checklists, installation procedures, post-installation
tips, basic housekeeping tasks, FreeBSD ports philosophy, file systems,
disks, vinum volume manager, various input/output peripherals, network
administration, DNS, firewalls, servers, X-Window systems, configuration
files etc. That's quite a lot !
Most of the chapters or groups of chapters can be independently read. The
first chapter gives an overall introduction to Unix, its timeline and
position of FreeBSD in the overall hierarchy. The installation chapters
guide one through the cryptic details of how to install FreeBSD as part of
a dual boot system and make the task appear simple. This is very helpful
to beginners, who often tend to install new operating systems as dual boot
systems because if something goes wrong they can go back to the original
operating system. In this regard, the author guides readers through
sharing disks, explaining some Microsoft oddities etc. The author
explains detailed instructions for configuring keyboards, mice, X windows,
and the all nine yards of the process. After reading the first six
chapters, readers should go and get the latest FreeBSD CD-ROMS and install
on a test machine and proceed reading further chapters with trying hands
on all the tasks described in the book.
For running the system on a daily basis, certain essential knowledge is
required. Some examples are creating user accounts, basic process
management, installing packages using ports collection, file system
management etc. These are explained in various chapters clearly. There is
a chapter dedicated to disks and vinum volume manager. For readers
interested in programming and looking into the source files, they should
see the source files in the FreeBSD machines and explore them now as they
read through the chapters. This process will cement the ideas deep into
their minds. Burning CD's on FreeBSD system is explained in a dedicated
chapter and this should make the process a breeze for those interested in
burning CD's whether iso images or mp3 songs. There are four chapters
delving into details of tapes, floppies, backup and printers. Configuring
printers can look hard to beginners. Author gives plenty of
troubleshooting tips in this regard.
Chapters 17 through 20 discuss the issues pertaining to getting
FreeBSD connected to the Internet and network administration tasks. Since
most ISP's shun customers who are non-Microsoft, author goes into details
of questions that one should ask and a checklist to be prepared is given.
Whether the connection is through PPP over serial lines (through 56k
modem) or PPP over Ethernet (DSL), the author gives various nuances to
configure the machines properly. There are chapters on DNS, firewalls and
proxies. Though the chapters are detailed, they are meant to ignite the
interest in the users. Readers should go and do a detailed in-depth
research on these fields (go to FreeBSD website, look at source code or
read the man pages). Lots of client server applications are explained.
e.g., ssh, telnet, http.
Chapter 28 is dedicated to Xfree86. I would have preferred it to
be much upfront in the book, This is definitely one of the area that most
users stumble and some even quit because of the roadblocks presented by
Xfree86. This is a must read chapters for beginners and even for somewhat
experienced users. Very well presented.
Last few chapters are very useful for developers and
administrators. The chapter on configuration files is an invaluable asset
to anybody. Anyone wishing to update the system from say, one version
FreeBSD 5.0 to FreeBSD 5.1 gets all the information here. Overall, this
is a wonderful book and must have for anyone running FreeBSD on their
machines. This book will turn out to be a handy reference in times of need.
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