Freebsd Unleashed - Softcover

Tiemann, Brian; Urban, Michael

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0672324563 ISBN 13: 9780672324567

Publisher: Sams, 2003

Synopsis

Did you know that the special effects used in The Matrix were rendered using the FreeBSD system? Yahoo and the Internet Movie Database are also powered by FreeBSD. Now you can learn how to use FreeBSD to its full potential as well! FreeBSD Unleashed is a complete reference guide for FreeBSD administrators, developers, webmasters and database administrators and developers who want to learn more about this Unix-based, robust network. Once you've learned the tips and tricks included in FreeBSD Unleashed, you will be able to contribute your ideas to the FreeBSD open source project and help it grow!

About this title

Review

Because it's very popular among Internet service providers (ISPs), FreeBSD is likely the Unix flavor you work with when you Telnet into the server that hosts a Web site. For that reason, it's worth having FreeBSD Unleashed around if you frequently need to log in to various hosted environments but don't do your day-to-day work on a FreeBSD computer. If you're running FreeBSD on your own machine--and more than a few Linux critics say you should be--you'll get even more out of this book, particularly if you prefer to have your reference materials on paper. It's a good idea to have them that way when you're having problems getting FreeBSD to connect to the Internet, after all.

This book explains, succinctly, how to do basic utilitarian stuff like moving files and creating users, and advanced utilitarian stuff like "building the world" from raw source. Further, the authors explain Unix concepts (like the shell and its relationship to the kernel) clearly and in ample detail. Michael Urban and Brian Tiemann also go beyond FreeBSD itself, explaining such concepts as wide area networks (WANs) and basic, environment-neutral Perl programming. Whether these inclusions are valuable extras or extraneous padding depends upon your perspective, but there's no doubt that the authors maintain a high quality standard throughout their documentation of FreeBSD and its allied technologies. --David Wall

Topics covered: Using and enjoying the FreeBSD flavor of Unix, with emphasis on versions 4.4 and 5.0. Instructions and explanations--all rather detailed--appear on installing the operating system, configuring groups and users, setting up daemons (including those for network services like mail), and connecting to other computers (as well as the Internet). Installable copies of FreeBSD 4.4 and 5.0 ship with this book.

About the Author

Michael Urban is a biology student at the University of Minnesota. His current work on research projects involving African lions for the Lion Research Center includes programming projects with Java and C++. Michael has worked with various forms of Unix for several years, including FreeBSD, Linux, and Solaris. He has also worked as a technical analyst and is the author of Sams Teach Yourself FreeBSD in 24 Hours, also from Sams Publishing. In his free time, which is very sparse these days between exams and research projects, he enjoys reading and is also starting to pursue wildlife photography.

Brian Tiemann has been a constant user of FreeBSD since his student days at Caltech, where he used it to build a movie fan Web site that continues to grow and sustain an ever-increasing load. Born in Ukiah, California, Brian has remained in the state all his life; he currently lives in San Jose and works in the networking appliance field. Aside from FreeBSD, his other interests include Macintoshes, motorcycles, and animation, topics about which he writes frequently.

Edition details

• Publisher: Sams
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0672324563
• ISBN 13: 9780672324567
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 974