A.P. Lawrence

Running Linux (4th Edition)

• Matt Welsh, Lar Kaufman, Matthias K. Dalheimer, Terry Dawson
• O'Reilly
• 0596002726

Order (or just read more about) Running Linux (4th Edition)  from Amazon.com

Just the fact that this is the fourth edition should tell you how good this is. I never owned the first edition, and skipped the third. By page count, this is only 42 pages longer then that second edition, and yet it immediately seemed to me that there is much more here.

There is. Obviously there have been cuts too - warnings and workarounds for problems and situations that no longer exist, reduction of some tables and listings that probably never were really necessary. There are new chapters (I don't know if they are new from the 3rd edition), and new sections.

I like that the book provides a fair amount of troubleshooting information along with its basic introductions. Of course, that does mean that it will quickly become outdated, just as previous editions have. Some Amazon reviews complain about this sort of thing, but I still think it's better to include it.

Other reviews have complained that this isn't a beginners book. Perhaps it is not - I hesitated before including it in that category, but ultimately decided that it still belongs there even though it may be a little more advanced than a rank beginner might desire. Actually, I'm not even sure that's fair: a rank beginner will find this useful; it's just that they may find it a bit overwhelming too. This isn't "Linux for Dummies", it is very comprehensive and has more than sufficient detail in every area it covers.

Not too many of us will be able to dismiss this as "just stuff I already know", either. I picked up things in just a casual skimming, and even more when I went back to read carefully. Of course that is hard to do when you already have a fair amount of experience, but it's worth the effort.

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