Product: The Linux Command Line: A Complete Introduction

William E. Shotts, Jr.s The Linux Command Line is a book that attempts to give new users a thorough grounding in the peculiar bestiary of the Linux command line itself. Other books Ive looked at attempt to speak to two audiences, novices looking for an introduction as well as the power user looking to pick up a few new tricks. Shotts book is focused squarely on beginners, and attempts to give them a solid overview of the way to do things on the command line, as well as how to learn more. More than this, Shotts book attests, I think, to a kind of conviction that the command line is in many ways the right way to do things. As he says, a good command line interface is a marvelously expressive way of communicating with a computer in much the same way the written word is for human beings. (xxvi)

Shotts book is a kind of instruction manual for the command line, meant to be worked through sequentially. That is to say, the book is written for people, perhaps, who actually do sit down and read the instruction manual before trying to make use of a piece of technology. Theres something peculiar about a book that sincerely believes the user will read through 432 pages of information before jumping in, but theres something endearing about its earnestness as well.

The chapters are short, most confined to the discussion of a few commands. The chapters are a bit brief, frankly, and only give the reader a taste of Linux command line wizardry to be found in other books. On the one hand, whats there is good. I liked his discussion of locate and find, for example, and hes good at giving the reader enough depth to understand whats going on under the hood without oversimplification. (Its nice, for example, that he gives an early discussion of quoting, expansion, and keyboard shortcuts in chapter 7 and 8.) I can also imagine that the brevity of the chapters might provide a gentle introduction for someone whos just getting acclimated to the world of Linux. That said, I think that the greatest flaw of the book is that its organization is not, in fact, ideal for users fresh from a different OS: Shotts saves too many the great Linux commands until late in the book grep is essentially buried back in Chapter 19 while also delaying the discussion of features new users are going to expect from their OS. The discussion of locate and find doesnt come until Chapter 17, for example.

Finally, and though this is a nit, I think the book could have used a bit more reference to Perl. This is especially true because the books stated purpose is to give a broad overview of living on the Linux command line, and not merely an introduction to a particular shell. Perl is one of the most powerful ways to extend Linux beyond what you can do with existing command line programs, and it would have been nice for the book to give a sense of that even if all it did were to direct readers to the llama.

In sum, then, this book may not be the Linux gospel to press upon novices, but it is still a very solid and useful book for someone starting out. This may be perfect, however, for those who scrupulously read instruction manuals and are interested in learning Linux.

(Full disclosure: I received a free copy of this book from O’Reilly as a part of their Reader Review program.)
Rating: 4
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